A tool for environmental design

As consumers are concerned more about the environmental problems, they become anxious about how products affect the environment. But multiple factors like greenhouse effect, ozone depletion and acidification make it difficult for a designer to estimate a product's environmental influence at an early design stage. To solve the problem, we have introduced a tool named DFE (Design For Environment), which enables designers to estimate the costs and the environmental influence of products when disposed. The social background, criterions for the estimation, and overview of the DFE as well as current and future development activities at Sharp are described.