BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//Memento EPFL// BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:What is Sustainable Technology ? A materials perspective DTSTART:20141020T151500 DTEND:20141020T161500 DTSTAMP:20260509T225836Z UID:848e1c8f1e43ffe1a46b7b9ceca50a193581c65f4a9f781d9ba028a8 CATEGORIES:Conferences - Seminars DESCRIPTION:Prof. Mike Ashby\, Engineering Department\, Cambridge and Gran ta Design\, Cambridge\nA “sustainable development” is one that contrib utes in an equitable way to human welfare\, does so in a way that minimize s the drain on natural resources\, complies with the rule of law and is fi nancially viable.  Many academic\, civil\, commercial and legislative pro jects claim to do this\, and many of them are materials-related – exampl es are: developing biopolymers to replace those derived from oil\, imposin g carbon taxes\, promoting bamboo as a building material and subsidizing d omestic PV.  We refer to them as “articulations” of sustainable devel opment.  But how are they to be assessed?  There is no simple\, “right ” answer to questions of sustainable development – instead\, there is a thoughtful\, well-researched response that recognizes the concerns of st akeholders\, the conflicting priorities and the economic\, legal and socia l constraints of a technology as well as its environmental legacy.\nThis t alk will describe a framework for exploring sustainability from a Material s perspective. The aim is not to define a single metric or index of sustai nability\; rather it is to improve the quality of discussion and debate on projects that claim to be sustainable developments.   This suggests a m ethodology for the sustainability-analysis of products or projects\, suppo rted by a new CES Edu database\, SUSTAIN\, that provides some of the neces sary inputs.  The method and database will be illustrated by applying the m to a contemporary development – the electric car.\nBio: Mike Ashby is now Emeritus Professor in the Engineering Department at Cambridge Universi ty\, having previously held a Royal Society Research Professor at the Univ ersity of Cambridge\, and a Royal Academy of Engineering Visiting Professo r at the Royal College of Art in London.  He is the author of some 250 pa pers and a number of books on materials.  Among the more recent are “Ce llular Solids” (1988\, 2nd edition 1997)\, “Materials Selection in Mec hanical Design” (4th  edition 2011)\, “Metal Foams – a Design Guide ” (2000)\, “Materials and Design – the Art and Science of Materials Selection in Product Design” 3nd edition (2014)\, “Materials and the E nvironment”\, 2nd edition (2013)  and “Materials: Engineering\, Scien ce\, Processing and Design” 3rd edition (2014). His interests are in Des ign\, and in the role Materials play in it.  He is a founder and Director of Granta Design\, Cambridge\, a company specialising in materials inform atics and resources for materials education. LOCATION:CO3 http://plan.epfl.ch/?lang=fr&room=cO3 STATUS:CONFIRMED END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR