The Five Steps to Reinventing the World, Step 5: Reinvention
(excerpt from an article in November/December 2001 Green@Work magazine)
by William McDonough and Michael Braungart

As the creators of products and systems and the built environment, designers are the practical dreamers who turn inspiration into the actual world we inhabit—the cherished things we use everyday, the places we live and work, our much loved modes of communication and mobility.

We could say that design conceives our future; it is the first signal of human intention and it sets in motion a whole range of effects that ripple through human communities and the natural world—today, tomorrow and in some cases, nearly forever.

So what kind of future do we want to conceive? How can we act on our hopes intelligently to create a world of prosperity, abundance and delight? In this, the last of a five part series on ecologically intelligent design—what we call eco-effectiveness—we suggest some of the ways true innovation can begin to create a world in which the production and consumption of goods is not only safe and profitable but ecologically enriching and socially valuable.

The Five Steps to Eco-Effectiveness

Our five-step strategy describes a process in which designers employ an ever-broadening ability to define, select, and ultimately re-invent product ingredients, industrial systems, and even the relationship between producers and customers.

You may recall that the first step in the strategy aims to remove from a product a specific chemical widely known to be harmful. Step Two initiates the development of a list of preferred, readily available materials known to be healthful or harvested with minimal impact.

At Step Three designers begin a more comprehensive review, examining all of the materials used in an existing product while it continues to be manufactured. The goal is to replace problematic ingredients without missing a beat in the marketplace.

Step Four is the true entry into eco-effective design. At this point in the journey designers aim to actively define a product's ingredients, right from the start. The idea is not to limit the impact of a product or system but to conceive one with positive effects on the world.

A designer aiming for positive effects employs the intelligence of natural systems—the effectiveness of nutrient cycling, the abundance of the sun's energy-to create products actively defined as nutrients for the Earth's two discrete metabolisms, the cycles of nature and the cycles of industry. In a world of what we call cradle-to-cradle design, a product's biological nutrients and technical nutrients would flow in one or the other of these discrete, closed-loop cycles, providing nourishment for something new after each useful life. In the textile industry, for example, we've helped companies conceive fabrics that after each use become either mulch for the soil-a biological nutrient-or rematerialized ingredients for industry-a technical nutrient. Ultimately, products such as these eliminate the concept of waste.

At Step Five, designers ask not simply what ingredients would be nutritious but how a product might best celebrate a basic human need, revitalize an aspect of culture, or renew our engagement with the natural world. One might begin to ask: How might my product fulfill people's wants, needs and loves? Are my current business practices the best way to provide my service to customers? What service am I providing, anyway?

Example

Consider a product such as laundry detergent. A designer developing an eco-effective detergent might follow Steps One-Four to progressively create a product with only safe, nutritious ingredients. A Step Four soap might be defined by the chemistry of the local water supply. It might also be produced locally in dry pellet form and sold in bulk, obviating the need for packaging and the expensive long-distance transportation of heavy, liquid concentrates.

Those are all important innovations. But at Step Five a designer would begin to build on the reformulation of soap by focusing on the service it provides, developing an intelligent system for delivering an effective laundering service to customers. This strategy might include the washing machine itself, which would be conceived as a product of service designed for retrieval, disassembly and reuse. The machine would be delivered to a customer's home pre-loaded with detergent for 1000 loads of laundry—the customer pays not for the machine, but for the service. After the last of the machine's micro-filtered detergent has been dispensed, the appliance would be serviced or replaced, and its valuable materials would enter the technical metabolism to be used again in new machines.

An innovative commercial venture might focus on providing a community laundry service. Laundry could be picked up from customers in a hydrogen-fueled community vehicle and delivered to one location, where washing machines would run on the power of the sun and wastewater would be purified by a system of botanical gardens. The service might even provide a social venue, where those who chose to wash their own clothes could relax in a pleasant courtyard among the garden's flowering plants. Washing clothes, long considered environmentally unfriendly, suddenly begins to generate community wealth.

Conclusion

When companies adopt an eco-effective strategy such as this and engage in meeting customers' needs with a broadly conceived, positive agenda they are charting a course that can transform human industry. Rather than lamenting the human ecological footprint, eco-effective design conceives systems in which the flow of materials in the human economy supports the Earth's life systems while providing more people with more of what they need and love. Enduring wealth replaces endless waste; stories of hope outshine the tragic strategies of the past.

Why not leave a footprint worth celebrating?

Previous Monthly Features:

May 2001, "The Five Steps to Reinventing the World" (Step 1: Free of...)

June 2001, "Positive Design Decisions in an Imperfect Market" (Step 2: Personal Preference)

July 2001, "Textile Mills Lead Another Revolution"

August 2001, "Synthetic Materials for Eco-Effective Design"

September 2001, "Transforming Product Design within Current Production Systems" (Step 3: The Passive Positive List)

October 2001, "Do you know what they want to do now?" by Tim O'Brien, Director, Ford Environmental Quality Office

November 2001, "The Breakthrough to True Eco-Effectiveness" (Step 4: The Active Positive List)

December 2001, "Just Doing It. Nike's Track to Ecologically Intelligent Products" by Darcy Winslow, Nike Director of Women's Footwear