Hapuwatte, B. M., Badurdeen, F., Bagh, A., & Jawahir, I. S.

Increasing frequency of new product introduction reduces the potential to implement closed-loops and repurpose serviceable end-of-use resources, causing sub-optimal resource utilization. Furthermore, it hinders the transition to sustainable manufacturing and circular economy.  Although careful planning of inter-generational design compatibility allows implementing sustainable closed-loops even in fast-paced multi-generation systems, designers currently lack the product sustainability performance (PSP) forecasting methods required for such planning. Thus, this paper presents a new design methodology that forecasts and maximizes the closed-loop dynamic PSP by identifying the optimal component-level commonality between successive design generations. The proposed method employs the Norton-Bass diffusion model to forecast multi-generation demand and utilizes the Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm II to identify the optimal design configurations. The representative PSP objectives used in this work are: maximization of manufacturer gross profit maximization, minimization of total greenhouse gas emissions, and maximization of product’s functional value (for customer). The optimized inter-generational component commonality significantly improved all three objectives considered. The results further demonstrate the potential PSP improvements by optimizing the market introduction timing of successive product generations to increase closed-loop resource management effectiveness.

Multi-generational design; Component commonality; Sustainable manufacturing; Closed-loop resource optimization; Circular economy; Configuration design;