Achieving net zero carbon emissions is arguably one of the biggest challenges confronting contemporary society and economies.
Globally, and particularly within the tech sector, business leaders grapple with the imperative to minimise environmental impacts, while facing pressure to enhance efficiency.
Over the years, technology companies have been spearheading the global efforts to address sustainability, through various strategies from decreasing emissions during the extraction of raw material to product manufacturing and packaging processes.
While organisations face growing regulatory pressure to adopt sustainable practices, embracing sustainability can also offer benefits beyond compliance and reduced emissions. For example, sustainable product design can lead to increased customer satisfaction and drive revenue growth. In fact, studies show that 70% of organisations report improved customer satisfaction because of their sustainability efforts.
The Role of Sustainable Product Design
As sustainability becomes one of the central tenets of innovation, technology sector stands at the forefront of this transformative wave, navigating unique challenges and seizing new opportunities for growth.
With an increasing focus on radical climate actions, environmentally responsible product design emerges as a vital tactic to achieving the net zero. According to the latest research more than two-thirds of organisations have reduced their carbon emissions as a result of the implementation of sustainable product design strategies.
As the design phase plays a crucial role in achieving a business’s sustainability goals —where approximately 80% of a product’s environmental impact is determined — business leaders should prioritise creating products that minimise environmental and social impacts throughout their entire lifecycle.
Additionally, with increasing raw material scarcity due to environmental and geopolitical factors, organisations should consider reducing their dependence on virgin materials and strengthening their supply chain resilience – enabling a shift to a circular economy that decouples growth from the consumption of finite resources.
Innovative Approaches to Sustainable Design
One effective strategy in sustainable design is dematerialisation, which focuses on minimising material usage while emphasising product durability, repairability, modularity, recyclability, and recoverability. These design principles extend the lifespan of products and materials, significantly reducing waste.
Since the extraction and processing of primary raw materials are significant contributors to greenhouse gas emissions, reducing reliance on these resources allows businesses not only to advance their sustainability goals but also to build resilience against future supply chain disruptions.
Another effective strategy is incorporating post-consumer recycled content into products. These efforts are not limited to a few niche products but are becoming more mainstream, for instance some companies have made closed loop recycled plastics.
Sustainable Life Cycle
For businesses seeking to enhance sustainability it is essential to adopt a holistic approach. This means not only focusing on specific products but also examining the entire life cycle from design and packaging to end of life. It is crucial for all tech businesses to consider how sustainability can be maintained even after products and services have been purchased. Thus, enhancing product repairability is another key tactic to boost sustainability. Given that electronic waste contributes to 70% of all toxic waste and only about 12% of all e-waste is recycled properly right now, any action individual consumers can take to repair or recycle their old tech responsibility is a step toward a cleaner future. By integrating design features such as keyboard-free battery connectors and providing instructional repair videos, companies can make it easier for customers to repair their products, extending their lifespan and ultimately reducing waste.
A Common Goal
In 2024, organisations that focus on sustainable product design not only stand to gain from improved compliance, reduced emissions, and reduced resource scarcity concerns, but can also reap benefits such as increased revenue growth and improved relationships with customers and employees. Effective sustainability efforts require a comprehensive understanding of the product life cycle and the commitment to meaningful changes therefore transparency and evidence-based practices are crucial for gaining credibility and achieving significant environmental benefits.
Sustainability has yet to become central to the at most companies, and achieving net zero remains a monumental challenge. Overcoming this requires collaboration across all sectors, including governments and corporations, as well as industries like power, technology, and automotive, working together toward common sustainability goals.
About the Author
Mary Jacques is Executive Director, Global ESG and Regulatory Compliance at Lenovo. Lenovo is a US$57 billion revenue global technology powerhouse, ranked #248 in the Fortune Global 500, and serving millions of customers every day in 180 markets. Focused on a bold vision to deliver Smarter Technology for All, Lenovo has built on its success as the world’s largest PC company with a full-stack portfolio of AI-enabled, AI-ready, and AI-optimized devices (PCs, workstations, smartphones, tablets), infrastructure (data center, storage, edge, high performance computing and software defined infrastructure), software, solutions, and services.
