Abstract
In order to prevent global environment from serious impact of industrialization and pollution, developing products fit in with environmental concerns (called green product development) becomes a critical task for product designers and producers. This research focuses on two key issues, i.e., the green product development and the product life cycle assessment. We first adopt (1) the Theory of Inventive Problem Solving (TRIZ) and (2) Quality Function Deployment (QFD) from the viewpoint of life cycle assessment to guide the processes of green product development and improvement. The research defines the life cycle weights of all engineering requirements and integrates classical QFD methodology to identify important design requirements. These requirements are applied to the categorized engineering parameters of TRIZ as the foundation for finding feasible product solutions. After the development and improvement of green products, an evaluation method is developed incorporating Environmentally Responsible Product Assessment (ERPA). With the above described integrated approach, design engineers can rapidly evaluate new products under environmental consideration. The assessment result of product life cycle and environment impacts provides guidelines for engineers to improve product designs considering green factors. Finally, a prototyping system of the integrated green product development methodology is constructed to help engineers implement the real cases. In this paper, we work with industrial designers to implement two successful case studies. They are the green design improvement of TFT-LCD back light unit and internet communication circuit board.