Fraunhofer-Institut für Produktionsanlagen und Konstruktionstechnik IPK

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  • Publication
    Benefits and obstacles of sustainable product development methods
    ( 2017)
    Stark, R.
    ;
    Buchert, T.
    ;
    Neugebauer, S.
    ;
    Bonvoisin, J.
    ;
    Finkbeiner, M.
    In the last few years, numerous approaches have been introduced for supporting design engineers in developing more sustainable products. However, so far, these efforts have not led to the establishment of a commonly acknowledged standard methodology for Sustainable Product Development (SPD). This brings into question the relevance of developing new methods and calls for more efforts in testing the available ones. This article provides a reflection about the benefits and obstacles of applying existing SPD approaches to a real product development project. It reports the results of a project aimed at developing a new mobility solution under the constraints of sustainability-related targets. This project has led to the development of a new pedelec concept, focusing on the substitution of small passenger cars with the help of three SPD methods - Design for Sustainability Guidelines, Product Sustainability Index, and Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment. These methods have proved to be generally beneficial, thanks to a combination of qualitative and quantitative perspectives. However, the multitude of criteria offered by the methods put forth difficulties in evaluating which sustainability aspects are relevant and therefore lead to higher effort for information retrieval analysis and decision processes. Furthermore, the methods still lack an integrated perspective on the product, the corresponding services and the overarching system.
  • Publication
    Environmental energy efficiency of single wire and tandem gas metal arc welding
    ( 2017)
    Sproesser, G.
    ;
    Chang, Y.-J.
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    Pittner, A.
    ;
    Finkbeiner, M.
    ;
    Rethmeier, M.
    This paper investigates gas metal arc welding (GMAW) with respect to energy consumption and its associated environmental impacts. Different material transfer modes and power levels for single wire GMAW (SGMAW) and tandem GMAW (TGMAW) are evaluated by means of the indicator electrical deposition efficiency. Furthermore, the wall-plug efficiency of the equipment is measured in order to describe the total energy consumption from the electricity grid. The results show that the energy efficiency is highly affected by the respective process and can be significantly enhanced by a TGMAW process. The wall-plug efficiency of the equipment shows no significant dependency on the power range or the material transfer mode. Moreover, the method of life cycle assessment (LCA) is adopted in order to investigate the influences of energy efficient welding on the environmental impacts. In the comparative LCA study, the demand of electrical energy is reduced up to 24%. In consequence, the indicator values for global warming potential (100), acidification potential, eutrophication potential, and photochemical ozone creation potential are reduced up to 11%.
  • Publication
    Energy efficiency and environmental impacts of high power gas metal arc welding
    ( 2017)
    Sproesser, G.
    ;
    Chang, Y.-J.
    ;
    Pittner, A.
    ;
    Finkbeiner, M.
    ;
    Rethmeier, M.
    Single-wire gas metal arc welding (SGMAW) and high power tandem GMAW (TGMAW) are evaluated with respect to energy efficiency. The key performance indicator electrical deposition efficiency is applied to reflect the energy efficiency of GMAW in different material transfer modes. Additionally, the wall-plug efficiency of the equipment is determined in order to identify the overall energy consumption. The results show that energy efficiency can be increased by 24% and welding time is reduced over 50% by application of the tandem processes. A comparative life cycle assessment of a 30-mm-thick weld is conducted to investigate the influences of the energy efficiency on the environmental impacts. The environmental impacts on the categories global warming potential, acidification potential, eutrophication potential, and photochemical ozone creation potential can be reduced up to 11% using an energy-efficient TGMAW process.
  • Publication
    Sustainable Welding Process Selection Based on Weight Space Partitions
    ( 2016)
    Sproesser, G.
    ;
    Schenker, S.
    ;
    Pittner, A.
    ;
    Borndörfer, R.
    ;
    Rethmeier, M.
    ;
    Chang, Y.-J.
    ;
    Finkbeiner, M.
    Selecting a welding process for a given application is crucial with respect to the sustainability of part manufacturing. Unfortunately, since welding processes are evaluated by a number of criteria, preferences for one or the other process can be contradictory. However, the prevalent procedure of weight assignment for each criterion is subjective and does not provide information about the entire solution space. From the perspective of a decision maker it is important to be able to assess the entire set of possible weightings and answer the question which welding process is optimal for which set of weights. This issue is investigated by means of a weight space partitioning approach. Two welding processes are considered with respect to three criteria that reflect their economic and environmental performance. In order to find the most sustainable welding process the underlying weight space partition is evaluated.
  • Publication
    Adapting Ergonomic Assessments to Social Life Cycle Assessment
    ( 2016)
    Chang, Y.-J.
    ;
    Nguyen, T.D.
    ;
    Finkbeiner, M.
    ;
    Krüger, J.
    In Social Life Cycle Assessment (SLCA), the health and safety aspect of workers is usually evaluated by considering the numbers of injuries and accidents; however, the work related musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs), which dominate occupational diseases, are often neglected in SLCA since the effects do not occur immediately. Thus, the MSDs lead to increased working absences and compensation costs, and also reduced productivity of workers. To address the gap, applying ergonomic assessment is proposed since it identifies and quantifies the health risks at work based on a set of pre-defined criteria e.g. force, posture, repetition and duration, and provides the numeric results analyzing the physical load and their sources. In the study, the application of ergonomic assessment and its indicators in SLCA is displayed to screen risks and to further improve working place design.
  • Publication
    Environmental and Social Life Cycle Assessment of Welding Technologies
    ( 2015)
    Chang, Y.-J.
    ;
    Sproesser, G.
    ;
    Neugebauer, S.
    ;
    Wolf, K.
    ;
    Scheumann, R.
    ;
    Pittner, A.
    ;
    Rethmeier, M.
    ;
    Finkbeiner, M.
    Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and Social Life Cycle Assessment (SLCA) are applied in evaluating possible social and environmental impacts of the state-of-art welding technologies, such as Manual Metal Arc Welding (MMAW), Manual Gas Metal Arc Welding (GMAW), Automatic GMAW and Automatic Laser-Arc Hybrid Welding (LAHW). The LCA results indicate that for 1 meter weld seam, MMAW consumes the largest amount of resources (like filler material and coating on electrodes) and energy, which contributes to comparatively higher environmental impacts in global warming potential, acidification, photochemical ozone creation potential and eutrophication than other chosen processes. With regard to social aspects, the health issues and fair salary are under survey to compare the relative potential risk on human health caused by fumes in different welding technologies, and to indicate the sufficiency of current salary of welders in Germany. The results reflect that the wage status of welders is still fair and sufficient. The manual processes bring much higher potential risk of welders' health than the automatic processes, especially MMAW.
  • Publication
    Life Cycle Assessment of welding technologies for thick metal plate welds
    ( 2015)
    Sproesser, G.
    ;
    Chang, Y.-J.
    ;
    Pittner, A.
    ;
    Finkbeiner, M.
    ;
    Rethmeier, M.
    Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is applied in evaluating environmental impacts of state-of-the-art welding technologies. Manual Metal Arc Welding (MMAW), Laser Arc-Hybrid Welding (LAHW) and two Gas Metal Arc Welding (GMAW) variants are used to join a plate of 20 mm thick structural steel. The LCA results indicate that for 1 m weld seam, MMAW causes the highest environmental impacts in global warming potential (GWP), eutrophication potential (EP), acidification potential (AP), and photochemical ozone creation potential (POCP) among the selected processes, and the LAHW variant performances the least. Filler material and electricity consumptions generally dominate the impacts and reach shares of up to 80% and 61% in the respective impact categories. However, electrode coating consumption in MMAW remarkably contributes impacts on AP and EP, for instance 52% of AP and 76% of EP. Strategies for improvement of the applied welding technologies are discussed.
  • Publication
    Addressing sustainability and flexibility in manufacturing via smart modular machine tool frames to support sustainable value creation
    ( 2015)
    Peukert, B.
    ;
    Benecke, S.
    ;
    Clavell, J.
    ;
    Neugebauer, S.
    ;
    Nissen, N.F.
    ;
    Uhlmann, E.
    ;
    Lang, K.-D.
    ;
    Finkbeiner, M.
    Sustainability and flexibility are crucial aspects in todays' manufacturing processes. Within this study an innovative approach of modular machine tool frames (MMTF) equipped with micro system technology is presented that aims at enhancing flexibility of mutable production processes. This new approach extends the existing reconfigurable manufacturing systems (RMS). MMTF goes beyond the platform approach via minimizing the machine tool frame parts used for the building block system of manufacturing cells. The concept has been realized by integration of modularized microelectronics and actuators enabling for integrity and accuracy of the machine tool frame. In this contribution, sustainable hotspots for the production of the MMTF are identified via a tiered life cycle sustainability assessment. From these findings, new approaches are derived that provide for a reasonable usage of mechanical and electronic components in MMTF for sustainable value creation.
  • Publication
    Sustainable corporate development measured by intangible and tangible resources as well as targeted by safeguard subjects
    ( 2015)
    Orth, R.
    ;
    Scheumann, R.
    ;
    Galeitzke, M.
    ;
    Wolf, K.
    ;
    Kohl, H.
    ;
    Finkbeiner, M.
    The needed shift towards sustainable development in existing business processes can be achieved through the combination of the capital based approach and the life cycle sustainability assessment. This contribution performs an analysis and selection of assessment tools and indicators regarding the resources used in organisational processes and the life cycle of the products or services to measure the potential impacts on the environment and society. The relevance of intangible capital to improve the organisational sustainability performance as well as the expansion of the traditional dimensions of sustainability with the target of the six safeguard subjects: human health, social justice, ecosystem quality, financial stability, resource availability and man-made environment are integrated into a conceptual framework. This approach allows the development and implementation of strategies towards sustainable corporate development through a recommendation-based framework.
  • Publication
    Methodische Nachhaltigkeitsbewertung von Maschinenkomponenten im Entwicklungsprozess
    ( 2011)
    Stark, R.
    ;
    Lindow, K.
    ;
    Finkbeiner, M.
    ;
    Schau, E.