Green design of telecom products: the ADSL high speed modem as a case study

This paper discusses the principles of life cycle assessment (LCP) and design for environment (DFE) and their application in the design and development of the asymmetric digital subscriber loop (ADSL) high speed modem, This application was used as a case study to evaluate the feasibility of incorporating "green" issues into the design cycle, Section II focuses on the green design methodology. It describes some fundamentals and the state-of-the-art of LCA/DFE. It also raises some critical issues that show up in the definition of LCA/DFE methodology. Section III describes the actual case study. It shows how the green design methodology, described in Section Il, is adopted to the project under study. More specifically, it is described how the LCA is introduced into the physical design stage of the product, which assumptions are taken into account for the LCA analysis, and how the analysis affects the usual product design flow. It discusses how the study started by performing an LCA of the ADSL high speed modem R1 (Release 1), with a large emphasis on the analysis of manufacturing processes. Secondly, these LCA results were used as input for the DFE methodology, in order to design a perceived greener product, the ADSI high speed modem R2 (Release 2). The "greenness" of this new product is validated by comparing the two environmental profiles. This case study resulted in a coherent and extensive environmental assessment of some fundamental design options (and the associated manufacturing processes) involved in complex electronic devices. By implementing the results of this LCA into a specific DFE methodology, green design issues have been introduced in the design cycle as just another design constraint to be dealt with.