[Video Link for Email/Other Subscribers - 8.5min]
Rick Chin, Director of Product Innovation, gives a demo of the Sustainability Xpress add-on module for SolidWorks. It allow designers to quantify in real time the projected environmental impacts of the parts and assemblies that they create. Developed by German firm PE International GmbH in collaboration with SolidWorks, it’s currently available as beta release for testing and debugging.
As quoted from this release:
This software will provide valuable information for designers and engineers, enabling better informed decision-making that could significantly reduce the environmental impact of the products they design. SolidWorks Sustainability is built on PE International’s GaBi software and database, the world’s most comprehensive tool for quantifying the environmental performance of materials, processes, products, and infrastructure. PE International is the largest and one of the oldest networks of sustainability experts in the world and has performed product life cycle assessments for two decades, continuously gathering detailed data about materials and processes to improve the GaBi database.
The Sustainability software will be available in two product forms with this fall’s release of SolidWorks 2010: an “Xpress” version included with every license of SolidWorks 2010 and a professional version. Both the Xpress and professional products will display a dashboard at the bottom of the SolidWorks user interface that illustrates a design’s prospective carbon footprint, air impact, water impact, and energy consumed throughout the design’s lifecycle.
These impacts will automatically update as the user modifies their design. The Professional version will roll up the impacts of all parts within a product design and also add details regarding energy consumption during the product’s use phase. SolidWorks Sustainability is the only CAD-integrated software to provide a comprehensive view of a design’s environmental impacts. Its analysis accounts for details such as where the product will be manufactured and used.
Regional choices effect environmental factors such as: where and how raw material is mined; transportation impacts; energy sources (e.g., coal, nuclear, hydroelectric, etc.); and power consumption. The resulting analysis may then be exported to a report which can easily be shared with non-SolidWorks users. Project Sage is being developed in collaboration between Dassault Systèmes SolidWorks Corporation, PE International and its North American division, PE Americas.
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Great interview and very interesting subject! Thanks!