Life cycle engineering im Automobilbau

Ecobalance represents the basic principle for an environmental analysis and the starting point for the possibility of achieving improvements. Using the criteria related to both technology and ecology, this method has been expanded upon by IKP/PE and, over the course of many years, has proven to be a satisfactory method for those fields associated with industry and research. Data banks and software systems have been designed and are today applied in industry. An expansion of the holistic balancing to include the ‘social’ dimension is currently being developed by the IKP. Today, ecological decisions in technically and economically-associated areas are continuously being developed which place more emphasis on the preliminary developments than on a purely retrospective analysis. Aside from the continuous, further developments of these types of analysis with regard to never technical questions as well as the integration of newer aspects of optimization based on life cycle information (e.g. production balancing), the goal of further work includes the preparation of process-chain information in the respective in preliminary developments related to the design. The automobile industry consequently plays a significant role here, as was also the case in the initial transformation of methodology which was carried out in the 1990s. Finally, these developments are additionally motivated through the new ordinances presented to be employed throughout the entire EU. The responsibility attributed to a product over the course of its entire lifetime therefore plays a more prominent role. This is also reflected in ordinances like those related to the redemption of old automobiles or in the WEEE of the electronics industry (Directive on Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment).