Eco-design methods for developing new products based on QFD: a literature analysis

With the increasing pollution and consumption of natural resources due to the growing demand for manufactured goods, a number of eco-design methods aimed at achieving environmental suitability of products have been proposed since the 1990's. This study aimed at examining QFD applications that ensure the development of more environmentally suitable products. To this end, a systematic literature review of eco-design requirements was performed. This allowed for the identification of characteristics that the methods must meet from the environmental point of view and application. For this review on the eco-design requirements, 17 publications based on QFD were analyzed. One of the main results from the eco-design QFD analysis was the absence of the traditional QFD characteristics such as quality plan, design quality, and deployment of technical requirements into components, processes, etc. Another result determined through the analysis was that many authors consider only the house of quality as the whole QFD when they are developing environmental methods. In conclusion, most of these methods cannot be considered QFD, and often do not really promote environmental benefits as well.