Ethical issues in engineering design - 3TU.Centre for Ethics and ...

Ethical issues in engineering design
were both advisors for the project and were working on PhD-projects concerning
recycling of cars. However, a choice for an easy to recycle option was only made
in cases where this option was not significantly heavier than a lighter more
difficult to recycle option. A part where recycling was deemed important by the
design team was the understructure. The understructure was made of
aluminium and aluminium foam. It is usually understood in engineering that
aluminium is easy to recycle if two guidelines are used. The first guideline is that
wrought and cast aluminium should not be used together. If wrought aluminium
(more pure, less alloying elements and contamination) is recycled together with
cast aluminium (less pure, more alloying elements and contamination) then you
will get cast aluminium. The second guideline is that welded aluminium is easier
to recycle than bonded aluminium, the adhesive will contaminate the secondary
aluminium if it is not removed before smelting. The design team acknowledged
these guidelines and tried to use them in the design.
Pete and Dave introduced the term “emotional sustainability” in the sense that
more satisfaction than only that of arriving at B having set out from A should be
gained from driving with the car. The car should give more pleasure and
satisfaction while driving and while standing still than other cars. Emotional
sustainability included, according to the design team, the car being fun-to-drive
and the driver having “an ageing, caring and exploring relationship” with the car.
68
Pete: ‘…that we create a sustainable use without the user realising this
because they are forced to handle the car sustainably. Light-heartedly,
being able to have fun driving.’
Drivers should get more value and satisfaction from using the car than only
getting from one place to another. According to the design team the extra value
should not only be experienced in the driving. More value can be gained from
multiple use for the car, e.g. using the car when standing still i.e. as playground
for children (see figure 4.4).
Figure 4.4: Make use of the car when standing still [picture courtesy of the
DutchEVO design team].