Adapted Product and Service Design – How to Work Together for a Sustainable Future?
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Presentations
Introduction
Technological features are not the only important part of successfull energy systems. This session focused on the design of technology - not only on the look of a charge controller but the whole system needed.
To get an overview on this topic two lecturers introduced their perspective on the design question. Prof. Kalevi Ekman from Finland is founder of the Aalto University Design Factory and gave an general idea of what especially engineers should know about design. Noara Kebir is the Managing Director and co-founder of MicroEnergy International, a company specialized in supporting financial institutions to develop and implement energy specific programs. She gave a more detailed insight into the role of design in microenergy solutions.
Perspectives to Design
Prof. Ekman likes to pose questions. Think about this one: What is design? The usual picture in our minds is one of fancy, expensive and useless artefacts such as tableware or vases. If you think a little longer business-to-customer products as mobile phones and cameras might come to our minds. Design as a measure to be competitive on the market.
The design quality seems to be hard to put a finger on. Normally, engineers work with matriceses to calculate e.g. the price per kilogram of a number of products. Let's compare some numbers: A steak could cost some 20€ per kg in Finland. Another everyday product in the land o the woods is paper which costs less than 1 €/kg. To get a little closer into the topic of energy, what about a wind mill? It costs about 1.5 million euros/300 tons. So it`s price per kilogram is somewhere around 5€. The before mentioned camera comes at 1,000 €/kg and a light weight pair of glasses at 180 € per 1.8 grams, which makes 180,000 €/kg.
We obviously don't pay for the weight of a product we get. This leads us to another question: What do we pay for?
