Sustainable Engineering: Trends And Solutions

This assessment task requires students to examine current articles and reports in the past 24 months relating to sustainable engineering/practises and to perform a critical analysis of the subject area covered in a specific article. Articles may cover areas such as new manufacturing processes, extraction of materials/minerals, infrastructure challenges, renewable technologies, food production, etc. Students are required to demonstrate/speculate on how existing or new engineering practises/solutions can address these challenges in the short and longer term.

Objectives of this Assessment Paper

This research paper on sustainable engineering reviews the current trends and solutions relating to the sustainable practices and engineering by majorly considering food production, renewable technologies, new manufacturing processes, and extraction of minerals or materials, and infrastructure challenges. The concept of sustainability aims at making critical decisions concerning the long-term performance of critical resources so as to preserve these resources to the future generation. Sustainable engineering practices can be defined as the process of designing and operating systems in a way that they use energy resources sustainably to prevent the depletion of these resources to the future generation.

The concept of sustainability is currently becoming very significant in all the engineering practices making the sustainability of resources to be the major aim of human development. The major factors of sustainability critically analyzed in this assessment paper include the social sustainability, economic sustainability, and environmental sustainability. The social sustainability entails the social equity, labour rights, social justice, cultural competence, and community development. The economic sustainability entails manufacturing processes, infrastructure, food production, extraction of materials and minerals and renewable technologies.

The major objectives of this assessment paper include:

• To critically analyze the sustainable engineering practices
• To evaluate factors affecting the sustainability of resources
• To analyze the effects of sustainability on the future generation
• To speculate over the current practices implemented to promote sustianabili8ty
• To evaluate how sustainability practices will attain the future needs of the future generation

The major factors of sustainability critically analyzed in this assessment paper include the social sustainability, economic sustainability, and environmental sustainability. The social sustainability entails the social equity, labour rights, social justice, cultural competence, and community development. The economic sustainability entails manufacturing processes, infrastructure, food production, extraction of materials and minerals and renewable technologies (Allenby, 2017). Economic sustainability involves the complete sustainability program including strategies to prevent the threats and impacts rising the destruction of the natural environment of living organisms, chemical pollution from agricultural and industrial wastes and chemicals, emission of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere industries (Yates & Lacouture, 2017).

Social sustainability is the capability of any social system in an organization or society to attain a good social well-being. Social sustainability calls for proper democracy and governance which will ultimately promote pen structure governance and accountability. Economic sustainability focuses on the need of ensuring that the extraction and use of natural resources such as materials, minerals, fuels, energy, land, and water are used at a rate that is sustainable. This aspect is guided by the growth development and productivity of any system that have implemented the sustainable engineering practices (Babu & Reddy, 2018).

The manufacturing processes fall under the economic sustainability. The manufacturing industries are currently under pressure to produce innovative solutions which fulfil the rapid development of needs of the community. This pressure is ever increasing due to the requirement to implement more sustainable practices for the manufacture and design of services and products. The connection between the operation and manufacturing to the environment is currently being recognized progressively. The progress, profitability, and productivity of the manufacturing companies are progressively being considered as the strategic approaches in the process of manufacturing. Some of the sustainable engineering practices that have been successfully implemented in manufacturing companies include the design for environment and life cycle analysis approaches (Azapagic & Perdan, 2018).  

Current Trends in Sustainable Engineering

The design and manufacturing of environmentally friendly products using environmentally sustainable engineering practices can promote the successful introduction and maintenance of the product in the market and also its entire lifecycle. There is also a need for improvements in the manufacturing and product handling through reduction, reuse, recycling, and remanufacturing of the products. The reduction process entails the production of an exact quantity of commodities that are required by the market to prevent wastage as a result of excess supply. Recycling and reuse of the disposed of products should also be an initiative of the company so as to reduce the level of pollution caused by their products and also reduce the use of raw materials (Babu & Reddy, 2018).

Sustainability of the food production sector is also another significant sector where the consumption and preservation of natural resources need to at a stable rate. Agricultural sector strongly depends on the available natural resources, and the over usage of these resources may result in depletion of these resources causing food insecurity to the future generation. There is a need for implementing modern cultivation practices and machinery in the agricultural sector so as to promote the production of food and also encourage the increase in the percentage of land used for the cultivation purposes. Sustainable food production practices class for improvement in the food production efficiency while conserving the diverse and natural ecosystem upon which the supply of food for the future generation will heavily depend on (Brebbia & Beriatos, 2018).

Some of the sustainable food production practices that are currently being implemented in the agricultural sector include the efficient land usage for agricultural purposes, improvement in the soil nutrients through natural methods, forestry, oceanic management and efficient production of food. The engineering practices seek to reduce the environmental threats such as over-cultivation, climatic change, land degradation, freshwater scarcity, and contamination of rivers and freshwater caused by agricultural chemicals. These practices aim at improving the level of sustainability in the agricultural sector and also food production, by improving the quantity and quality of agricultural products and also preserving the natural resources (Chang, 2018).

The mining sector is one of the contributing factors towards the economic development of any country through taxes from the mining industries and also through economic and social infrastructural development in the region where the mines are situated. Despite these benefits, the mining sector poses a huge challenge towards sustainability, and hence there is need of implementing sustainable engineering practices in this sector so as to preserve the minerals and materials extracted for the future generation. There is a need for the implementation of new technologies in the mining sector so as to preserve the future availability of minerals and materials. The sustainability in the mineral and materials extraction depends on the future requirement of the resource, price fluctuations, the application of the minerals, and the downstream manufacturing (Dinachandran, 2017).

Social and Economic Sustainability

The mining industries should take social responsibility of ensuring safe working condition by proving a safe working environment to the miners. These companies should also minimize the negative impacts of different mining processes related to the extraction of materials and minerals on the numerous forms of the natural environment and geological environment. The extraction of these minerals should not minimize the groundwater or river levels especially those water sources situated around the mines. There is also need of evaluating the entire lifecycle of the product made from these minerals so as to identify the opportunities towards sustainability such as reduce its environmental impacts, conserve the resources, and reduce the cost. The concept of the circular economy should also be applied to the minerals and materials processing plants so as to promote dematerialization and detoxification of these extracted minerals (Kauffman & Mo, 2017).

The structural engineers play a significant role in solving the environmental challenges caused by the design and construction of infrastructural projects. There is a need of these engineers to consider the social, economic, and environmental sustainability of any infrastructural project. The first solution towards the infrastructural challenges is the improvement in the life cycle performance of any infrastructural project so as to decrease the maintenance and allow for the proper disposal of the materials used in the project. There is a need for providing measurable improvements in the environmental and economic performance during the design and construction of infrastructural projects. During the design stage, he recycled or salvaged materials should be identified so as to prevent the depletion of natural resources used during construction (Kelly & Luke, 2017).

The design and construction process of the infrastructural projects should adopt the use of alternative materials so as to reduce the use of concrete and steel which are the most commonly used materials despite their high energy requirement and high emission of carbon into the environment. There is a need of infrastructural developers to explore the use of alternative materials to replace concrete and steel in the construction of these projects. Especially for infrastructural projects which are being constructed with a shorter lifespan, the engineers should explore the application of alternative materials so as to attain economies and efficiency, while minimizing the negative impacts of construction to the environment (Langston, 2017).

The transport sector should implement new policies which promote economic incentives in the construction industry. These policies should promote higher life cycles for infrastructural projects and higher impacts on the environment. The greater consumption of materials during construction is normally encouraged by the proportional payment of an amount equal to the materials used. These incentives should focus on reducing the number of materials used in the construction which will, in turn, reduce the cost of construction and preserve the environment (Lucena & Schneider, 2017).

Designing Environmentally Friendly Products

Sustainable energy is an energy system that serves the demands of the present without affecting the capability of the future generation meeting their energy demands. The current emerging renewable energy technologies that can be implemented to promote the energy sustainability include mirin energy, concentrated solar photovoltaics, enhanced geothermal energy system, cellulosic ethanol and artificial photosynthesis. The raw materials and components used in these projects are manufactured and designed in fossil-fueled companies and the finished products can then be transported to the sustainable energy sources. There is also a need to implement numerous approaches aimed at reducing the use of conventional energy from fossil fuels to attain the energy requirement from a structure (Mines, 2018).

The combination of numerous designs of passive solar can easily be integrated into new structures based on the local climatic condition of the building, the orientation of the building, and the site of the structure. The integration of solar passive features into the structure for the purposes of lighting will result in reduced consumption of energy by the structure which ultimately minimizes the emission of carbon dioxide and assists in sustainability in development. Another significant aspect of energy efficiency is the use locally available materials and embodied materials for construction to prevent the energy input in the structure and hence minimizing the emission of carbon dioxide from the construction sector (Radovanovi? & Popov, 2018).

The paper reviews the current trends and solutions relating to the sustainable practices and engineering by majorly considering food production, renewable technologies, new manufacturing processes, and extraction of minerals and materials, and infrastructure challenges. The concept of sustainability is currently becoming very significant in all the engineering practices making the sustainability of resources to be the major aim of human development (Radovanovi? & Popov, 2018). The design and manufacturing of environmentally friendly products using environmentally sustainable engineering practices can promote the successful introduction and maintenance of the product in the market and also its entire lifecycle. Some of the sustainable food production practices that are currently being implemented in the agricultural sector include the efficient land usage for agricultural purposes, improvement in the soil nutrients through natural methods, forestry, oceanic management and efficient production of food (Yong & Mulligan, 2017).

Allenby, B., 2017. The Theory and Practice of Sustainable Engineering: International Edition. Sydney: Pearson Education Limited.

Azapagic, A. & Perdana, S., 2018. Sustainable Development in Practice: Case Studies for Engineers and Scientists. Perth: John Wiley & Sons.

Babu, S. & Reddy, K., 2018. Geoenvironmental Practices and Sustainability: Linkages and Directions. Michigan: Springer.

Brebbia, C. & Beriatos, ?., 2018. Sustainable Development and Planning III, Volume 2. New York: WIT Press.

Chang, B., 2018. Systems Analysis for Sustainable Engineering: Theory and Applications. Melbourne: McGraw Hill Professional.

Dinachandran, L., 2017. INTRODUCTION TO SUSTAINABLE ENGINEERING. Michigan: PHI Learning Pvt. Ltd.

Kauffman, J. & Mo, K., 2017. Handbook of Sustainable Engineering. New York: Springer Netherlands.

Kelly, W. & Luke, B., 2017. Engineering for Sustainable Communities: Principles and Practices. Mumbai: American Society of Civil Engineers.

Langston, C., 2017. Sustainable Practices in the Built Environment. New York: Routledge.

Lucena, J. & Schneider, J., 2017. Engineering and Sustainable Community Development. London: Morgan & Claypool Publishers.

Mines, R., 2018. Environmental Engineering: Principles and Practice. New Delhi: Wiley.

Radovanovi?, M. & Popov, S., 2018. Sustainable Energy Management. Michigan: Academic Press.

Robertson, M., 2017. Sustainability Principles and Practice. Colorado: Taylor & Francis.

Sarte, B., 2017. Sustainable Infrastructure: The Guide to Green Engineering and Design. Colorado: John Wiley & Sons.

Vanegas, J., 2018. Sustainable Engineering Practice: An Introduction. California: American Society of Civil Engineers.

Yates, K. & Lacouture, D., 2017. Sustainability in Engineering Design and Construction. Perth: Taylor & Francis.

Yong, R. & Mulligan, C., 2017. Sustainable Practices in Geoenvironmental Engineering, Second Edition. Toledo: CRC Press.