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Eco Selector Properties

Low carbon footprint and energy efficient design

This data module is a superset of the MaterialUniverse data module. The Eco Selector Properties data helps you to:

Design products for:

Low carbon footprint
Energy efficiency
Water efficiency

Investigate how new product design can impact CO2 reduction
Optimize your product against legislative or regulatory requirements
Implement enterprise- or group-wide strategies to reduce the environmental footprint of your company’s products
Introduce 'life cycle thinking' to your organization without imposing unrealistic burdens

The problem

The wave of interest in environmental issues is now beginning to have real consequences for business, as a result of:

Legislation - of which the European Union's EuP (Energy using Products) directive and international moves towards carbon trading are early examples

Consumer pressure for "low carbon" products

Organizations are beginning to respond by reviewing their existing operations for energy efficiency and/or reductions in carbon. But companies can make a much greater contribution to carbon reduction by design – designing their new and next generation products to have a lower carbon footprint and/or energy usage.

This is only possible if carbon and energy of a product can be:

Calculated over its lifecycle
Optimized by change of design

The Granta solution

Achieving these goals is intimately connected to materials and manufacturing selection in the product design process. The Eco Selector Properties module provides the required data. The CES Eco Selector (which supports materials selection decisions) and the GRANTA MI:Enterprise Materials Optimizer (which enables enterprise-wide materials strategies) are two tools that use the data for design optimization.

The materials and properties

Eco property data is available for every materials in the MaterialUniverse. This includes broad coverage of metals, plastics, elastomers, ceramics, composites, and natural materials. The Eco Selector Property data module adds the property information show in the table to the standard engineering and economic properties available for each material.

Properties are drawn from or estimated using the best available and highest quality sources currently available. Properties in red are new in the March 2008 release. All other properties have been reviewed in the light of latest available data.

Lifecycle phase	Property
Raw materials: Primary material production: energy, CO2 and water	Embodied energy, primary production (MJ/kg)
	CO2 footprint, primary production (kg/kg)
	NOx creation (g/kg)
	SOx creation (g/kg)
	Recycle fraction in current supply (%)
	Water usage (l/kg)
Manufacturing: Material processing energy (MJ/kg) CO2 footprint (kg/kg)	Casting CO2 & energy
	Forging, rolling CO2 & energy
	Metal powder forming CO2 & energy
	Vaporization CO2 & energy
	Polymer molding CO2 & energy
	Polymer extrusion CO2 & energy
	Polymer machining CO2 & energy
	Ceramic powder forming CO2 & energy
	Glass molding CO2 & energy
	Standard machining CO2 & energy
	Non-standard machining CO2 & energy
	Simple composite molding CO2 & energy
	Advanced composite molding CO2 & energy
	Construction CO2 & energy
Use: Bio-data	Toxicity rating (non-toxic, slightly toxic, toxic, very toxic)
	RoHS (EU) compliant grades? (yes/no)
	Approved for skin and food contact (yes/no)
	WEEE prohibited (yes/no)
	The engineering and physical properties (e.g., density) in the MaterialUniverse database support calculation of, e.g., energy consumption during use
Disposal: Material recycling	Recycle? (yes/no)
	Embodied energy, recycling (MJ/kg)
	CO2 footprint, recycling (kg/kg)
	Recycle fraction in current supply (%)
	Downcycle? (yes/no)
	Biodegrade? (yes/no)
	Landfill (yes/no?
	Non-recyclable use fraction
Background data: Geo-economic data for principal component	Principal component (material name)
	Annual world production (tonnes/yr)
	Reserves (tonnes)
	Typical exploited ore grade (%)
	Minimum economic ore grade (%)
	Abundance in earth's crust (ppm)
	Abundance in sea water (ppm)

Support for education

This data can also be accessed via CES EduPack for educational purposes. More...