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The study provides an inclusive research landscape of the thematic trends and evolution in the field of metrics in the circular economy (CE), and also outlines future perspectives in circularity metrics (C-metrics) by exploring the relevant literature over the period 2011–2023. This study aims to bring further clarity to the wide pool of available c-metrics and orient future research. In this regard, the following research questions are addressed: How has the research landscape of metrics in a CE evolved? What are the prominent research themes and recent trends of C-metrics? And what are the sought-after areas of future research in C-metrics development? To achieve that, this study used data analysis and qualitative content analysis methods to explore the C-metrics related to scientific groundwork based on 544 articles from 187 journals over the period 2011–2023. As a result, (i) six main research themes of C-metrics in the literature are identified; (ii) four recent trends of C-metrics are mapped to highlight the role of C-metrics-based tools in circularity performance assessment, circular design, monitoring and reporting, and database and platforms; and (iii) the future research agenda for C-metrics is proposed based on the current challenges in the studied area, expert opinions, and concerns derived from EU regulations and circular initiatives. The findings provide a better understanding of the evolution of scientific production and trends over time and clarify future research directions for C-metrics corresponding to the ongoing concerns.

Abstract Urban mobility contributes significantly to greenhouse gas emissions and comes with negative social impacts for various groups, such as limited accessibility to opportunity or basic services. Transitions towards sustainable and people-centred urban mobility systems are paramount. Yet, this is accompanied by various challenges. Complex urban systems are accompanied by high uncertainties (e.g., technological progress, demographics, climate change) which are currently not well integrated. Possible solutions originate from design, policymaking, and innovation, with a widespread disconnection due to non-compatible methods. This paper presents a method to improve the ability to design future urban mobility systems by integrating different approaches for modelling what the future could be and who could be the users. The research question is how diverse future user needs can be integrated in design processes for urban mobility systems. The proposed scenario-based design and personas allows to create data-driven proto-personas—a set of archetypical users with assigned characteristics and behaviours—test their validity, derive distributions across geographical areas, and transform them for different 2030 scenarios. This serves as input to create full personas and synthetic populations as intermediary design objects for the collaboration of designers and simulation experts. The methodology is exemplarily applied in the context of Paris. It contributes to urban mobility solution design that is more aware of future uncertainty and diverse needs of users, therefore, better capable to respond to today’s challenges. The approach is replicable with open data and accessible source code: https://github.com/TjarkGall/proto-persona-clustering .

This article explores a new approach to anticipate the social impacts of disruptive products, using autonomous vehicles (AVs) as a case study. It highlights the limitations of current methods in predicting the social effects of new products and proposes that futures studies and strategic foresight can provide better techniques. The main hypothesis is that experts in social sciences can anticipate long-term social impacts by considering contextualized future product usages. The authors propose a new model called Representation–Usage–Impact (RUI), which combines expert knowledge from sociology and other fields. The article presents a detailed structure for the model and describes how experts can contribute their knowledge. Sessions were organized with experts to link AV usages with potential social impacts. The results demonstrate that social science experts can identify a wide range of potential long-term social impacts. The article suggests that the RUI model should be integrated and tested into design and decision-making tools to enhance the understanding of product impacts in practical contexts.

The radical innovation design (RID) comparator is an unprecedented method for design comparison. It overcomes the limitations of traditional methods with a nuanced, structured approach that emphasizes detailed analysis over simple grading. At its core, the RID comparator employs a novel ontology based on the RID building blocks, enabling a precise alignment of activities and solutions. This alignment is deepened through the innovative “quantities of pain” metric, a tool that allows for a refined evaluation and comparison of solutions, facilitating the calculation of effectiveness indicators in a data-driven manner. The true impact of the method is demonstrated through an industrial use case on solutions for cleaning solar panels. The RID comparator demonstrates its practical efficacy in addressing complex, multifactorial design challenges, by constructing a cognitive model of the cleaning activity not only encapsulating the myriad aspects of the design problem but also generating a wealth of discussion and consensus-building among stakeholders. The resultant cognitive model serves as a pivotal tool in redefining the process of generating innovation briefs, deeply rooted in the actual needs and constraints of real-world scenarios. In essence, the RID comparator method significantly enhances the efficiency and quality of innovation processes, particularly in complex industrial contexts.

Due to recent technological advancements, automation and autonomous solutions are gaining increasing popularity. Yet, a lack of in-depth investigations is noticed on the potential environmental benefits and economic repercussions of implementing autonomous systems. The present study aims to fill part of this gap by quantifying the environmental and economic sustainability of a robotic lawn mower, in comparison with human-operated counterparts. Combining life cycle assessment and life cycle costing methodologies, and by defining adequate functional units, building simulation models, and collecting life cycle inventory data, a systematic comparative study between autonomous and conventional lawn mowers is performed on their environmental and economic impacts. Through this multi-indicator analysis, environmental and economic trade-offs between the autonomous and conventional mowing solutions are quantitatively discussed for key relevant usage scenarios, from mowing an average residential yard to maintaining larger fields like a football stadium or a schoolyard. Concretely, sensitivity analyses on key parameters influencing the performance of the autonomous mower have been conducted to evaluate the environmental and economic benefits of an augmented robotic mower. While optimising the path planning of the current robotic mower would lead to the most substantial savings, improvements on the battery performance, cutting width, and speed of the autonomous solution appear as other promising areas for future work.

Ecodesign has gained significant traction in recent years ranging from academic research to business applications at a global scale. Initial emphasis on the environmental aspect of design has evolved to include economic and social aspects, with projects ranging from small-scale products to large-scale industrial systems. In this paper, the authors re-analyse 10 of their major ecodesign research projects of the past ten years to identify five categories of challenges and promising future directions for ecodesign research. This paper is primarily a retrospective position paper based on the authors’ experience of actual design studies, providing also a relevant literature review and summary of design practices.

Travelers interact with a large number and variety of products and services during their journeys. The quality of a travel experience depends on a whole urban mobility system considered in space and time. This paper outlines the relevant concepts to be considered in designing urban mobility. The goal is to provide a language and insights for the early stages of a design process. A literature review sheds light on the complexity of urban mobility from technical, sociotechnical, and user experience perspectives. Observations of experiences in urban areas provide data for describing and understanding travel experience patterns and issues. The paper proposes a conceptual model to describe and analyze different facets of traveler experience and categorizes problems that travelers face when they interact with an urban mobility system. A case study is reported illustrating the use of the conceptual model in identifying travel problems for a demand-responsive transport service.

The integration of environmental aspects in design frameworks has become a necessity for manufacturers to maintain their market position. This is especially true in the Computer Aided Design (CAD) phase, which is the last phase in the design process. At this stage, more than 80% of choices have been made. However, the environmental impacts generated by the remaining choices are significant. Features Technology (FT), the core of the CAD phase, is used to integrate environmental aspects. This paper presents a literature review of different works based on FT to ecodesign products. First, we present an overview of features in CAD systems. Second, we present a critical review of works done on ecodesigning with features that we divide into two subsections: the first one concerns CAD-Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) integration (methodologies, prototype tools, and commercial tools), and the second one, works using FT in CAD phase to reduce the environmental impact of one life cycle stage such as material selection or manufacturing. Finally, we propose an approach based on FT for ecodesigning products to promote simple new ecodesign tools which will help the inexperienced designer.

Serious games (SGs) offer an engaging format for teaching industrial engineering (IE) methodologies. IE methodologies involve people following a process in a set of conditions to design, improve and install systems, which are easily scripted into gameplay. The scholarship has proposed co-design approaches for teachers and SG designers. However, teachers are not always ready to engage, and designers can readily create SG elements rapidly alone. We propose a co-design framework to distinguish their roles and four tools for them to better embed relevant expertise in the SG design process. A first tool is a domain decomposition model, which helps teachers create the knowledge repository for an IE methodology. Then, a specification vector is provided to define clear learning objectives. The third tool is a mapping table that inspires designers building gaming elements based on the learning objectives. The final tool is a verification table that helps check whether the learning experience offered by a SG is aligned with its learning objectives. A game on innovation management was designed that adopts the co-design framework. It was tested in three sessions with 23 players, resulting in a playful learning experience.

The importance of taking user experience (UX) into account during design is increasingly recognized. In this context, this article looks at UX design activities carried out by teams of designers, and how they can be improved. To this end, the first step is to provide designers with the means to analyze their current UX design activities using graphical representations that will allow them to establish a diagnosis, with the strong points and points for improvement in relation to UX. However, although the literature contains numerous UX models and graphical representations of design processes (project chronicles), there is no model that represents the UX conceived within a design process. To overcome this problem, we propose two models: a UX metamodel as a lexicon for describing UX, combined with a “UX chronicle” model representing the UX conceived through design activities. This lexicon is the first building block of a UX design language. We use this “UX Chronicles” model to diagnose five transportation design projects. These chronicles revealed three problems: the way UX is taken into consideration varies significantly from one design project to another, a lack of UX specification and evaluation as well as a lack of certain key UX elements such as the users’ characteristics, knowledge and preferences. While the approach proposed in this article still requires work on validation and roll-out, it enables the diagnosis of UX design activities and the formulation of personalized recommendations, which, to our knowledge, does not exist in the literature.