OKALA GUIDE & OTHER TOOLS

FOR PRACTICING & BEGINNING DESIGNERS

OKALA GUIDE 2007 EDITION

Okala provides an introduction to ecological and sustainable design for practicing and beginning designers. Okala means "life sustaining energy" in indigenous Hopi language. It envisions a future where we recognize the value of global ecology and work to insure its protection. The Okala guide revised in 2007 with emphasis on usability to practicing designers and design students. Key attributes of this revised edition include:

• Updated Lifecycle Impact Assessment methods that include use the newest environmental impact characterization methods and normalization data from the US EPA, as well as the newest weighting values from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)
• Okala impact factors (incorporating the aforementioned methods) for 240 materials and processes which enable estimation of the ecological performance of any product or system
• Global climate change values (in CO2 equivalents) for the same 240 materials and processes
• State of the art design guidelines for disassembly and recycling
• Expanded explorations in environmental ethics, bio-mimicry, and design to stop climate change
• Additional references to socio-economic relationships
• New Green Marketing data and Product Life Cycle costing analysis

Okala was co-developed by Philip White, Louise St. Pierre and Steve Belletire. Eastman Chemical, Whirlpool and the IDSA/EPA Partnership supported its development. The course modules were designed to be easy to integrate into existing classes. Over 60 design schools in North America requested the Okala materials.

Click to order the Okala Design Guide 2007




This sample of the Okala Design Guide (in PDF) offers selected pages from the document.

DOWNLOAD IDSA_okala_guide_web.pdf


This document corrects CO2 equivalency values for several transportation values published in the 2007 Okala Course Guide.

DOWNLOAD Okala transportation CO2 values

Readings

Module 2
Chapters 1 & 2, The Green Imperative (1.3 MB)
/Victor Papanek, Thames & Hudson, 1995/

Module 4
Chapter 1 & 3 Silent Spring (632 KB)
/Rachel Carson, Houghton Mifflin Company Boston-NY, 1962/
Chapter 2 The Ecology of Commerce (1.1 MB)
/Paul Hawken, Harper Collins, 1993/

Module 6
Chapter 5, Design + Environment (341 KB)
/Lewis and Gertsakis, Greenleaf Publishing, 2001/

Module 8
Chapter 2, Sustainable Solutions (347 KB)
/Tischner and Charter, Greenleaf Publishing Limited Sheffield, UK, 2001/

Module 10
Chapter 4, Design + Environment (1.2 MB)
/Lewis and Gertsakis, Greenleaf Publishing, 2001/

Module 12
Matter Matters, Eternally Yours (386 KB)
/Verbeek & Kockelkoren, 010 Publishers, 1997/

Module 14
Chapter 3, Design + Environment (797 KB)
/Lewis and Gertsakis, Greenleaf Publishing, 2001/

Module 17
Chapter 3, Green Marketing (381 KB)
/Jacquie Ottman, NTC Business Books Chicago, IL, 1997/
Chapter 5, Green Marketing (910 KB)
Guides for the use of Environmental Marketing Claims (76 KB)
/US Federal Communications Commission/

Module 18
Chapter 4, Sustainable Solutions (1 MB)
/Tischner and Charter/

Okala presentation CD and videos

Instructors of ID or product design can receive the Okala educational presentations (in PowerPoint) and the instructor's guide on CD. Videos are ordered directly from their producers. Instructors can contact Professor Steve Belletire, U. of Southern Illinois Carbondale.

OTHER TOOLS

ANCILLIARY TOOLS AND RESEARCH

Business-Ecodesign Tools

Business-Ecodesign Tools (2000) provides a concise and practical toolkit for designers to improve the environmental performance of products. It addresses business integration in both corporations and consultancies, describes fast impact reduction methods and impact factors created using the European Eco-Indicator '99 impact characterization method.



VIEW the online version of Tools (ideal for printing).

DOWNLOAD IDSA_Business_Ecodesign_Tools.pdf (1.1 MB)

Ecodesign Information Surveys

The following documents resulted from surveys taken about the ecodesign information needs of IDSA members.

2004 Ecodesign Information Needs Report
This report compiles the results of a voluntary survey taken of practicing product designers who were members of IDSA in August 2004. The IDSA Ecodesign Section compiled this information as input for the Partnership between the IDSA and the US Environmental Protection Agency.



DOWNLOAD IDSA_Ecodesign_Report_Oct_04.pdf (208 KB)


2003 survey: Ecological performance of electronic products
Survey of product designers from IDSA conducted by the Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition and Orb Analysis for Design in 2003.



DOWNLOAD IDSA_Elec_Prod_Ecodesign.pdf (124 KB)

For additional design tools and methods: see Strategies under selected links