Abstract
Due to the increase in the negative impact of products on the environment, and the rapid quantitative and technological development of products over the last decades, designers and manufacturers have become more concerned about environmental issues. This paper presents a novel methodology to fulfill eco-design requirements through the integration of environmental quality function deployment (EQFD) into computer-aided design (CAD) software at the early design stage. The main goal of this research is to reduce environmental impacts such as raw material consumption, energy consumption, air and water pollution, and material financial impact. The developed methodology consists of several steps, firstly, the EQFD translates the voice of the environment (VoE) into engineering metrics, then the metrics are correlated into product components through correlation matrices to identify the metrics and components that have a high effect on the environment. Secondly, the identified components are assessed from an environmental point of view. The environmental assessment is accomplished through a comparison of different alternative (scenarios) materials to capture the most environmentally friendly one. Life cycle assessment (LCA) method is used to fulfill this purpose through the use of CAD sustainability software (SolidWorks) to assess the environmental impacts of a product. The assessment process was accomplished by calculating the environmental impacts which are: carbon dioxide (CO2), energy consumption rate, air and water pollution rates, and the material financial impact. The refrigerator was selected as a case study for the demonstration of this research methodology. The results of the assessment show that Polypropylene (PP) is the most environmentally friendly material according to the compared ones