GE Researches Lifecycle of Products
General Electric is establishing an Ecoassessment Center of Excellence in upstate New York that will be dedicated to analyzing the eco-impact of GE products at every stage of their life span.
Otherwise known as life cycle assessment (LCA), the concept evaluates the lifecycle of a given product. Several factors are weighed, including the amount of energy used to:
- Acquire raw materials in nature (e.g. mining for metals)
- Process these materials into a consumer good
- Ship a finished product to retail stores
- Assemble and run the product during use
- Dispose of the product at the end of its life
One technique that GE’s researchers are already investigating is the use of biofuel during production, which could reduce the global warming impact of a product by 40 percent. Biofuel is typically derived from crops instead of relying on non-renewable resources for energy.
The product development is not just focused on energy savings. In the video below, GE’s scientists discuss their latest effort to produce a single disc that can store 5000 GB of data. That’s equal to 4000 times the information a human brain can store over a lifetime.
GE will also be increasing its investment in research and development to $1.5 billion in 2010, doubling the amount spent in 2005. This corresponds with an increase of environmental products manufactured from 17 to over 80 since 2005.
“Our team at GE Global Research is committed to applying and developing the measurement tools and processes needed to fully assess a product’s environmental impact,” says Bill Flanagan, head of the Ecoassessment Center. “In turn, we hope to minimize this impact in a way that helps the environment and leads to cost savings for GE and our customers.”
