Posts Tagged ‘behaviour change’
Eco-Ideation Tool: Re-Thinking Product Design
Posted in Research, Tools by Kate Archdeacon on August 3rd, 2011
Source: Food Climate Research Network (FCRN)
Bocken N M P, Allwood J M, Willey A R and King J M H (2011). ‘Development of an eco-ideation tool to identify stepwise greenhouse gas emissions reduction options for consumer goods’ Journal of Cleaner Production 19 1279-1287
Abstract
Pressure on consumer goods manufacturers to develop new products with significantly less environmental impact is growing, through increased consumer awareness of environmental issues and governments setting ambitious emissions reductions targets. A strategic response to this pressure is to prepare a portfolio of innovative product ideas to meet a range of future emissions reductions targets.However, although extensive work exists on ideation (the generation of novel product ideas) and ecodesign (design for reduced environmental impact), eco-ideation (generation of ideas that particularly aim to reduce environmental impacts) has had little attention.
The challenge of eco-ideation is to release the creativity of a broad range of employees, only few of whom may be familiar with the drivers of environmental impact. This paper proposes a novel tool to facilitate the generation of radical product and process ideas giving step-change reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. The features of products and processes that drive greenhouse gas emissions across the product life cycle were characterized with a set of indicators. A simple visual tool was created to show these indicators on a sliding scale between best and worst imaginable performance. A leading question associated with each slider was designed to stimulate lower impact ideas.
The tool was iteratively refined and simplified through structured testing with individuals from across a range of roles and differing knowledge of environmental impacts. The final eco-ideation tool used 14 scales, with leading questions for each scale developed to stimulate idea generation. The tool’s effectiveness was evaluated through use in a series of 15 individual workshops and compared with the outcomes of an equal number of conventional 12-person group-brainstorming sessions.
The comparison suggests that using the simple tool generally leads to a wider range of more radical ideas than emerge from group brainstorming.
Read more about the Eco-Ideation paper here.
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Contested Streets: Breaking NY City Gridlock
Posted in Movements, Research by Kate Archdeacon on July 20th, 2011
Source: Streetfilms via Going Solar
From “Contested Streets: Breaking New York City Gridlock” by Clarence Eckerson, Jr:
Produced in 2006 as part of the New York City Streets Renaissance Campaign, Contested Streets explores the history and culture of New York City streets from pre-automobile times to present. This examination allows for an understanding of how the city — though the most well served by mass transit in the United States — has slowly relinquished what was a rich, multi-dimensional conception of the street as a public space to a mindset that prioritizes the rapid movement of cars and trucks over all other functions.
Central to the story is a comparison of New York to what is experienced in London, Paris and Copenhagen. Interviews and footage shot in these cities showcase how limiting automobile use is in recent years has improved air quality, minimized noise pollution and enriched commercial, recreational and community interaction. London’s congestion pricing scheme, Paris’ BRT and Copenhagen’s bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure are all examined in depth.
New York City, though to many the most vibrant and dynamic city on Earth, still has lessons to learn from Old Europe.
Watch the film on Vimeo
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One Revolution: Bike Delivery Service
Posted in Movements by Kate Archdeacon on July 15th, 2011
One Revolution LLC is a member owned bike delivery service located in Burlington, Vermont. One Revolution’s mission is to provide expedient bicycle pick-up, delivery, marketing, and promotional services for individuals, local businesses, and organizations. We provide a delivery and promotional model for our partners whom share a common vision of sustainable, environmentally friendly, delivery of Vermont products while exerting a positive influence on the well being of our community. We provide bike delivery services to include catering delivery, wholesale and retail delivery, grocery delivery, CSA (community-supported agriculture) shares, compost and recycling, document delivery and publication distribution.
- CSA and Farm Produce Bike Delivery
Have your CSA share delivered to your door by bicycle. We work with Burlington area CSA farms to make farm fresh produce easily accessible to everyone. One Revolution will deliver your weekly share by bike to your home or office every week allowing you more time to create amazing meals. - Catering Delivery
Local restaurants have partnered with One Revolution to offer bike delivery of catered meals. View menus from these great Vermont Businesses, place your order, and let them know you’d like it delivered by bike! - Revolution Compost (Pilot Program)
Weekly food waste pick-up (and finished compost product return) by bicycle. This is your chance to not only reduce the amount of waste being trucked to landfill, but to reduce the amount of fossil fuels that would otherwise be used to truck this waste to landfill or industrialized compost facilities. Revolution Compost uses bicycles to provide this year-round service and recycles your kitchen scraps into rich organic compost.
www.onevt.com
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Collaborative Consumption: Infographic
Posted in Movements, Tools by Kate Archdeacon on July 13th, 2011
Source: Fast Company‘s Co.Design
Infographic by Collaborative
From “Infographic Of The Day: A Tour Guide To Collaborative Consumption” by Morgan Clendaniel:
You might own some tools that you never use, or perhaps you have a backyard that you just don’t have the time to do anything interesting with. Until recently, those pieces of property mostly served as nagging reminders that you didn’t have enough time to do everything you wanted to do. Today, they can look like revenue streams, not wastes of money.
Ideas about ownership of property are slowly starting to change in this country. The success of Zip Car and of bike sharing programs in a few major cities are the vanguard of a host of different “collaborative consumption” services and businesses that allow people to monetize their own unused resources, or to find ways to get goods and services without purchasing them. This infographic shows some of the stuff that might be lying around your house that are just profits waiting to happen — and all the start-ups trying to help you along.
This infographic was made by the venture fund Collaborative–which invests in collaborative consumption businesses–and the Startup America Partnership in order to help illustrate the economic benefits of this idea.
Read the full article by Morgan Clendaniel to find out more about specific start-ups, including Park At My House and TaskRabbit (where you can get paid to assemble other people’s IKEA furniture).
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Sustainable Restaurant Association (UK): Network for Restaurants, Suppliers & Diners
Posted in Models, Movements by Kate Archdeacon on July 6th, 2011
Via Food Climate Research Network (FCRN)
The Sustainable Restaurant Association is a not for profit membership organisation helping restaurants become more sustainable and diners make more sustainable choices when dining out. We help our member restaurants source food more sustainably, manage resources more efficiently and work more closely with their community. Our independently verified star rating system means diners can choose a restaurant that matches their sustainability priorities. We recognise restaurants as one, two or three star sustainability champions depending on how they rate against a wide range of criteria covering 14 areas of sustainability. So, whether a diner’s main concern is animal welfare or carbon reduction, the SRA and its members are committed to a change for the better. We also help keep sustainability on the news agenda at a local and national level, running campaigns on issues such as finding more sustainable fish supplies, food waste and energy efficiency.
Ways in which we’ve helped restaurants be more sustainable.
Since our launch in March 2010 we’ve provided restaurants with hundreds of practical, cost saving, sustainable solutions across our three sustainable categories. Here are just a few examples of the varied ways in which the SRA has helped our members:
- Society – Ping Pong, with 12 sites in London, wanted to engage with a local charity working with homeless people – we put them in touch with St Mungo’s and now they are working together.
- Environment – Quo Vadis, in Soho, asked to us solve their waste problem. The restaurant recognised it was sending too much to landfill. We introduced them to Harrow Waste. Now nothing goes to landfill, they have installed a glass crusher, cardboard and glass is separated from the rest and they are starting to recycle paper and plastic, saving thousands of pounds in the process.
- Sourcing – In early 2011 all 11 Leon restaurants introduced a new item on its menu – the fish finger wrap and wanted to be sure that the cod was from a sustainable source. Our extensive research proved positive and now the wrap is Leon’s bestseller – making it sustainable in every sense.
www.thesra.org/
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Well worth reading the SRA 2010 Report for more detail on the way it’s been working. KA
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Transport Emissions: Behaviour Change More Important Than Technology or Efficiency
Posted in Models, Research by Kate Archdeacon on June 28th, 2011
Image: icedsoul photography .:teymur madjderey via flickr CC
From “Behaviour change, not technology, is key to cutting vehicle emissions” by Nadya Anscombe:
When it comes to reducing emission from light-duty vehicles (LDV), researchers in the US have shown that technology alone is not the solution. In a paper published in Environmental Research Letters (ERL), Jalel Sager and colleagues from the University of California show that to meet greenhouse-gas emission and climate-reduction goals for the year 2050, the way in which we use LDVs has to change.
Co-author Daniel Kammen told environmentalresearchweb: “Reducing LDV emissions is often thought of as a technological challenge, with efforts going into the development of more efficient cars or fuels that produce fewer greenhouse gases per unit energy. However, by decomposing transport-sector emissions into technological and behavioural drivers, we show that even significant technological advances will be insufficient to meet climate goals, unless the growth in LDV use slows or reverses.”
To quantify the carbon dioxide mitigation challenge for the transport sector, the researchers surveyed 2007 LDV usage and fuel economy in an economically diverse set of countries. They found that the large differences in per capita LDV greenhouse-gas emissions (range: ˜100–4000 kg of carbon dioxide equivalent per year) are principally explained by differing national per_capita LDV use (range: 300–13,000 vehicle kilometres travelled (VKT) per year), rather than to fleet average fuel-efficiency and carbon-intensity factors, which reflect the broadly similar car technology worldwide.
The researchers forecast that meeting greenhouse-gas targets through technology developments alone would require universal deployment of one or more of the following clusters: electric vehicles running on nearly zero-carbon electricity, cellulosic biofuel-powered vehicles achieving 300 miles per gallon (0.78 l per 100 km), or gasoline-fuelled vehicles achieving in excess of 1000 mpg (0.24 l per 100 km).
“These performance levels exceed even the most optimistic technology scenarios for the year 2050,” said Kammen. “This shows that reducing greenhouse gases emitted by LDVs is a behavioural issue, not a technological one.”
Kammen cites several success stories of cities that have relatively low greenhouse-gas emissions from LDVs because of relatively compact urban development. For example, citizens of Hong Kong, Seville, Turin, Valencia, Lisbon, Bologna, and Moscow use between 5,000 and 11,000 MJ per capita per year for travel through these relatively compact areas, with more than half of all trips taken by foot, bicycle or public transport. Meanwhile, in cities with higher personal vehicle use, such as Chicago, Houston, San Diego or Washington, inhabitants use 44,000 to 86,000 MJ per capita per year, with less than 16% of all journeys accomplished through non-motorized or public means.
As well as improved urban planning and public transport, the researchers say that pricing policies and parking and congestion fees have also been shown to influence travel behaviour. Steadily increasing fuel taxes have proven especially useful in many developed countries, for example Germany, in reducing VKT and encouraging automakers to increase fuel efficiency over time. They point out that “the US, with some of the lowest fuel taxes in the developed world, seems ripe for such a measure”.
“There are so many opportunities available to us to reduce our greenhouse gases from LDVs,” said Kammen. “The question is, can we implement them quickly enough?”
Read Nadya Anscombe’s article (and associated links) on Environmental Research Web.
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From Here to There: Marketing and Branding Public Transport
Posted in Models, Research by Kate Archdeacon on June 23rd, 2011
Source: The City Fix
In an attempt to give public transport a competitive edge, EMBARQ has released a report on marketing and branding public transport. The reports aims to help guide cities and public transit agencies in making mass transit a competitive and desirable alternative to private vehicles. Titled, “From Here to There: A Creative Guide to Making Public Transport the Way to Go,” the report hopes to encourage cities and transit agencies to think critically and creatively about how to make public transport the preferred way to travel.
The purpose of the guide is to help transit agencies develop strong and successful strategies to achieve three important goals:
- Attract new users that currently use private transport, such as cars and motorcycles,
- Retain existing public transport users who might feel compelled to buy a private vehicle, and,
- Secure political and financial support from government officials.
By taking a cue from the private sector, which routinely and successfully influences consumer behavior, the report applies eight branding, marketing and communications tactics to the public transport sector.
- Brand and identity
- Internal communication
- User education
- User information systems
- Marketing campaigns
- Public relations and external communications
- User feedback systems
- Online engagement
“For some time, it has been clear that cities need to create high-quality public transport systems to improve the urban environment,” the report explains. “However, not until recently has it become clear that cities must also convince the public that these high-quality systems are in fact high-quality.”
The recommendations in the report are by no means prescriptive or exhaustive. The report is merely a starting point for exploring ‘best practices’ in the public transport marketing and branding world. With the launch of “From Here to There,” EMBARQ hopes to start an open dialogue that will enhance public transit and the very quality of our cities.
This report is only the beginning of EMBARQ’s efforts in helping public transport become a stronger alternative to private vehicles. We will also launch a series on online engagement for public transport starting in October 2011. Stay tuned!
Download the report in English and Portuguese.
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Redefining apathy: Dave Meslin on TED.com
Posted in Opinion by Kate Archdeacon on May 31st, 2011
What if Nike advertised the way that local government advertises Notices of Application?
From the transcript:
How often do we hear that people just don’t care? How many times have you been told that real, substantial change isn’t possible because most people are too selfish, too stupid or too lazy to try to make a difference in their community? I propose to you today that apathy as we think we know it doesn’t actually exist, but rather, that people do care, but that we live in a world that actively discourages engagement by constantly putting obstacles and barriers in our way.
Local politics — schools, zoning, council elections — hit us where we live. So why don’t more of us actually get involved? Is it apathy? Dave Meslin says no. He identifies 7 barriers that keep us from taking part in our communities, even when we truly care. (Recorded at TEDxToronto, October 2010, in Toronto, Ontario. Duration: 7:05)
Watch the video on TED here – the video seems to run out before the end of Dave’s talk, so read the transcript to get the final few seconds.
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Chromaroma: Public Transport Game for London
Posted in Models, Tools by Kate Archdeacon on May 26th, 2011
Via Springwise
Chromaroma is a game that shows you your movements and location as you swipe your Oyster Card in and out of the Tube (Bus, Tram and Boat coming soon). It connects communities of people who cross paths and routes on a regular basis, and encourages people to make new journeys and use public transport in a different way by exploring new areas and potentially using different modes of public transport.
At its simplest, Chromaroma is about amassing the most points possible. By watching your own travel details you can investigate interesting new ways to travel and exciting new destinations in order to get more points. Grab “multipliers” and bonus points by working with a team, building up connections with fellow passengers and discovering mysteries that are attached to locations on your routes.
Beyond competition and conquest, Chromaroma’s gameplay opens up the beauty in the city’s transport flows and reveals to its most persistent players some of the mysteries of travel, and even the strange characters travelling through the tunnels in the centre of the system, who may hold the secrets to your city.
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I don’t totally understand this game, but mixing up social networking with real-time information and alternative transport use is something we’re pretty interested in at VEIL. Check out Chromaroma on Vimeo to find out (a little) more. KA
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Pros and Cons of Re-Manufacturing: MIT Energy Analysis
Posted in Research by Kate Archdeacon on May 24th, 2011
Source: Environmental Research Web
From “When is it worth remanufacturing?“:
It seems like a no-brainer: Remanufacturing products rather than making new ones from scratch – widely done with everything from retread tires to refilled inkjet cartridges to remanufactured engines – should save a lot of energy, right? Not so fast, says a new study by researchers at MIT. In some cases, the conventional wisdom is indeed correct. But out of 25 case studies on products in eight categories done by a team led by Professor of Mechanical Engineering Timothy Gutowski, there were just as many cases where remanufacturing actually cost more energy as cases where it saved energy. And for the majority of the items, the savings were negligible or the energy balance was too close to call.
Why are the new results so different from what might have been assumed? The MIT team looked at the total energy used over the lifetime of a product – a life-cycle analysis – rather than just the energy used in the manufacturing process itself. In virtually all cases, it costs less money and less energy to make a product from the recycled “core” – the reusable part of the product – than to start from scratch. But the catch is that many of these remanufactured products are less energy efficient, or newer versions are more energy efficient, so the extra energy used over their lifetime cancels out the savings from the manufacturing stage.
[...]
Gutowski emphasizes that this research does not necessarily suggest a specific course of action. For any given product, there may be other reasons for preferring the remanufactured version even if it produces a net energy penalty. For example, remanufacturing may reduce the burden on landfills, reduce use and disposal of some toxic materials, or produce needed jobs in a particular area. And the expanded use of cell phones may have important social benefits, such as contributing to the recent wave of revolutions in North Africa and the Middle East. “We’re not saying you shouldn’t do it,” he says – just suggesting that it’s worth understanding the decision’s effects in their entirety. “You think you’re doing the right thing, it sounds so simple,” Gutowski says. But when it comes to understanding the true impact of purchasing decisions on energy use, “things are far more complicated than we expect.”
Interested? Read the full article from MIT on Environmental Research Web.
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