Julian Allwood Visual Arts submitted

1. Sustainable Manufacturing - What Would Make a Big Enough DifferenceJulian AllwoodCambridge University, UKMay 11, 2009 11:00 am Employee Lounge Bldg 101 NIST Gaithersburg MD • "Sustainable Manufacturing" is an ideal to which consumers, politicians and business leaders increasingly aspire. Attempts to move towards this ideal have to date largely been limited to changes that are cost-neutral and do not change the customer proposition of goods or services. What would make a big difference? • This talk will start by reviewing our recently completed project "Well Dressed?" which examined the options for major change in the fashion industry. This was the first attempt to explore the changes required to transform a whole sector towards sustainability. The project also showed that "sustainability" is an unreachable goal with unlimited measurement options. Accordingly our work has moved towards "Engineering for a Low Carbon Future" - a wider range of solutions to a narrower target. • The second part of the talk will examine the engineering options for change to global carbon emissions. The need for a significant reduction in greenhouse gas emissions to combat climate change is now widely agreed, but the means to achieve it is highly uncertain. Providing a carbon free energy supply by renewables, nuclear power, or carbon capture and storage requires an unprecedented scale of investment and construction. In parallel, step change reductions in energy demand must be made, but it is currently difficult to identify where sufficiently big differences can be made. The talk will present a top-down analysis of global energy use to direct attention to the big opportunities for energy efficiency, and will show that emissions from industry are dominated by production of 5 key materials (cement, steel, plastic, paper and aluminum). We will discuss options for cutting these emissions in the face of likely demand growth. • We will conclude by examining the measurement needs that will drive change towards both a low carbon and a more sustainable future. European developments are being directed very strongly by Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), but this has several problems which will be discussed. Bottom-up approaches to measurement will be contrasted with top-down approaches. In particular the likelihood that different measurement techniques will direct efforts to make a big enough difference will be evaluated. • For further information, contact Winnie Wong-Ng, x 5791, or Martin Green, x8496