ECOFRIENDLY PRODUCTS

Environment is the cause of concern for developed and developing countries.

A particular product may be considered ecofriendly when it meets either of the following criteria :

The negative externalities are either eliminated entirely or considerably reduced at all the stages of production - consumption cycle, as compared to the existing products providing identical or similar goods and services.

Not only is the product benign, but it also generates positive externalities for the environment.

There has been a trend the world over to go for labelling of consumer products as environment friendly, or comparative testing for more or less environmentally friendly products, so as to help in conservation of non renewable resources. Environment friendly products contribute to reducing environmental loads or to preventing environmental pollution. Ecolabelling and promotion of ecofriendly products further lowers their harmful effects on health, safety and environment

In order to make good product selections and to be motivated to change wasteful or ecologically damaging lifestyles, developed countries undertake ecotesting to furnish valuable information to consumers for preferential choices from the alternatives available in the market to eliminate or minimize adverse impact on environment.

From literature surveys conducted in the western world where ecolabelling is in vogue it is evident that production and manufacture of ecofriendly products has pressurised industry to resort to cleaner production technologies resulting into reuse, recycling and recovery of resources, less production of wastes, equity of resources, thereby collectively leading to sustainable development.

Environmentally sound product development is based on Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) "from cradle to grave" analysis or may be more correct "from conception to reincarnation" as this is being used in various forms in developed countries to develop eco-criteria for products. LCA is defined as a ‘Scientific and technical methodology to assess, analyze and evaluate environmental and other impacts of a product, product group or material’. LCA is a form of systems analysis for quantifying industrial processes and products by enumerating flows of energy and materials. The assessment includes the entire life cycle of the process, product and activity encompassing the extraction and processing of raw materials, manufacturing, transportation, distribution, use/reuse/maintenance, recycling and final disposal. Disposal option includes incineration, burial in landfill or recycling.

A number of different terms have been coined to describe the processes. One of the first terms used was Life Cycle Analysis, but more recently two terms have come to largely replace that one Life Cycle Inventory (LCI) and Life Cycle Impact Assessment (LCIA). These better reflect the different stages of the process. Other terms such as Cradle to Grave Analysis, Eco balancing, and Material Flow Analysis are also used.

Which ever name is used to describe it, LCA is a potentially powerful tool which can assist regulators to formulate environmental legislation, help manufacturers analyse their processes and improve their products and perhaps enable consumer to make more informed choices.
The most important feature of LCA is that it generates unambiguous values for each of the inputs and outputs in a product life cycle, in terms of raw material and energy/water consumption, and gaseous, liquid and solid wastes. Such a procedure facilitates comparison between specific attributes of the products and systems investigated. There seems to be significant limitations on the ways in which the data can be legitimately interpreted and used. The main critisism focuses on the fact that existing LCA’s are a form of inventory. The initial analysis identified qualitatively the most significant environmental impact rather than a quantitative analysis. Analytical tools give us little insight into how one should compare an energy intensive manufacturing process which emits few pollutants for instance, to a manufacturing process which uses less energy but emits more pollutants or how to compare a product which is durable but difficult to dispose of, to a product which has a shortern life but which breaks down less harmfully after disposal.

Ongoing research on this subject has led to a newly developed approach called the EPS system i.e. Environmental Priority Strategies in product design. It provides an opportunity to enumerate and assess environmental impacts of the consumption of energy and raw materials as well as pollutant emissions into various media, in terms of transferring an “environmental load profile” into an “Environmental impact profile” before aggregation and final evaluation, which provides a framework for an environmental impact, assessment of product choices. The objective of the EPS system is to make environmental impacts of products “visible” through a “transparent” eco-calculation procedure. It also provides a holistic picture of processes and products by offering a synthesis and integration of environmental concern into the concept.