Product design and development are key to moving towards a circular economy; however, the majority of products and components that are currently recirculated have not been designed for circulation of any sort. Circular economy business models and closing the loop can be functional only if the products and services are designed for circularity. This paper presents a set of generic design guidelines for different circular strategies. The guidelines are then used to map companies’ circular product design initiatives in the early stages of product design and development. The guidelines have proved to support decision-making and enhance the circularity of products. The guidelines were developed, validated, and tested at four companies within the Nordic countries through an action research approach. Sourcing raw materials, recycling, and ensuring the robustness of products for the use phase are the most common strategies used by the studied companies. There is an ongoing transition towards other recirculation strategies, such as repair, remanufacture, and reuse.
Product design and development are essential for a circular transition. Circularity decisions, such as those concerning the type of material, assembly method, and expected lifespan, made during the early design stages will significantly influence a product’s quality, cost, esthetics, sustainability, and circularity performance over the product lifecycle. However, circularity is not often considered in the early stages of product design and development. This paper presents the development of the concept circularity evaluation tool (CCET), which aims to support the evaluation of alternative product concepts in terms of their circularity potential in the early stages of product design and development. The CCET was iteratively developed based on an extensive literature review of the success criteria for tool development, guidelines, and existing tools for circular product design and development and strong collaboration with manufacturing companies. The tool was tested and verified at four manufacturing companies in Nordic countries. The tool has been proven useful for evaluating the circularity of products and supportive in the decision-making process in the early stages of product design and development.
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