-
Chapters from the paperback
- Introduction
- Ecocriticism
- Optimisation
- Grounded Economic Awareness
- Advertising Awareness
- Transition Skills
- Commons Thinking
- Effortless Action
- Permaculture Design
- Community Gardening
- Ecological Intelligence
- Systems Thinking
- Gaia Awareness
- Futures Thinking
- Values Reflection and the Earth Charter
- Social Conscience
- New Media Literacy
- Cultural Literacy
- Carbon Capability
- Greening Business
- Materials Awareness
- Appropriate Technology and Appropriate Design
- Technology Appraisal
- Complexity, Systems Thinking and Practice
- Coping with Complexity
- Emotional Wellbeing
- Finding Meaning Without Consuming
- Being in the World
- Beauty as a Way of Knowing
- Citizen Engagement
- Re-Educating the Person
- Institutional Transformation
- A Learning Society
- Additional chapters
- Interviews
Home » The Handbook of Sustainability Literacy » Chapters from the paperback » Appropriate Technology and Appropriate Design
Appropriate Technology and Appropriate Design
Appropriate Technology and Appropriate Design: the ability to design systems, technologies and equipment in an appropriate way. Mike Clifford, Faculty of Engineering, The University of Nottingham
____________________
Engineers and product designers have often been guilty of feeding on consumer wants rather than working to satisfy the basic needs of the global population. It is nothing short of scandalous that in the twenty first century, one-third of the world’s population – two billion people – do not have access to safe drinking water, whilst expensive projects such as the Large Hadron Collider (estimated final cost £5.5 billion) occupy the attention of engineers. ...Too often, engineers have ignored sustainability and designed equipment, processes and technologies without taking into account local factors such as culture, environment, gender, local availability of materials and local production methods. Market economics has pushed engineers into coming up with mass-produced ‘one size fits all’ solutions, which may be inappropriate for some. This is particularly evident when designing for remote communities both in economically well-off countries and, acutely, for those with fewer physical resources.
