The space heater shown in Figure 7.8 is carried as part of the equipment of a light goods vehicle used for railway repair work. It burns 0.66 kg of liquid propane gas (LPG) per hour, delivering an output of 9.3 kW (32,000 BTU). The air flow is driven by a 38 W electric fan. The […]
Category: Materials and the Environment: Eco-Informed Material Choice
Case study: a coffee maker
The 640 Watt coffee maker shown in Figure 7.6 makes four cups of coffee in 5 minutes (requiring full power) and then keeps the coffee hot for a subsequent 30 minutes, consuming one sixth of full power. The housing is injection-molded polypropylene, the jug is glass, there are a number of small steel and aluminum […]
Case study: an electric kettle
Figure 7.4 shows a typical 2 kW electric kettle. The kettle is manufactured in Southeast Asia and transported to Europe by air freight, a distance of 12,000 km. Table 7.5 lists the materials. The kettle boils 1 liter of water in 3 minutes. It Table 7.5 Electric kettle bill of materials, life: three years Component […]
Eco-audits
Figure 7.1 shows the procedure for the eco-audit of a product. The inputs are of two types. The first are drawn from a user-entered bill of materials, process choice, transport requirements, duty cycle (the details of the energy and intensity of use), and disposal route, shown at the top left. Second, data for embodied energies, […]
Exploring the data: property charts
Data sheets like those of Chapter 12 list material properties, but they present no comparisons and they give no perspective. The way to achieve these is to plot material property charts. Material property charts. Property charts are of two types: bar charts and bubble charts. A bar chart is simply a plot of the value […]
Energy and CO2 footprints of energy, transport, and use
Energy is used to make materials and to shape, join, and finish them to make products. Energy is used to transport the products from where they are made to where they are used, and the products themselves use energy during their lifetimes; some use a great deal. This energy is provided predominantly by fossil fuels […]
The eco-attributes of materials
Table 6.1 lists ecodata for materials in a similar format to the data sheets of Chapter 12. Here we step through the blocks, explaining what the names mean. The data themselves are drawn from many sources. They are listed under Further Reading at the end of this chapter. Geo-economic data. The first block of data […]
Data precision: recalibrating expectations
The engineering properties of materials—their mechanical, thermal, and electrical attributes—are well characterized. They are measured with sophisticated equipment according to internationally accepted standards and are reported in widely accessible handbooks and databases. They are not exact, but their precision—when it matters—is reported; many are known into three-figure accuracy, some to more. A pedigree like this […]
The consequences
The burden this legislation places on the materials and manufacturing industries is considerable. The requirements are far-reaching: ■ Documentation of the use of any one of 30,000 listed chemicals ■ Analysis of energy and material use in all energy-using products ■ Finding substitutes for VOCs and other restricted substances ■ Mandatory take-back, disassembly, and acceptable […]
Economic instruments: taxes and trading schemes
"Economic instruments manipulate market forces to influence the behaviour of consumers and manufacturers in ways that are more subtle and effective than conventional controls, and they generally do so at lower cost."[20] Well, that’s the idea. Taxation, one "economic instrument," might not strike you as subtle,[21] but it does seem to work better than "command […]