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A new generation of instrument panels will be characterized by a single material design. In the design process, more and more attention is directed to the life cycle steps after the usage phase of parts, products or systems. For this reason, the aim of every designer should be the development of a recyclable part, product or system. The request for the development should not only be recyclability, but also economic efficiency as well as low environmental impact during production and usage phase. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a tool for the development and design process to obtain an optimized economic and ecological (low environmental impact during the whole life cycle) product. A methodology, how Life Cycle Assessment could be integrated into the development and design process for parts, products and systems, will be presented.

For integrating Life Cycle Assessment into the design process it is more and more necessary to generate models of single life cycle steps respectively manufacturing processes. For that reason it is indispensable to develop parametric processes. With such disposed processes the aim could only be to provide a tool where parametric environmental process models are available for a designer. With such a tool and the included models a designer will have the possibility to make an estimation of the probable energy consumption and needed additive materials for the applied manufacturing technology. Likewise if he has from the technical point of view the opportunity, he can shift the applied joining technology in the design phase by changing for instance the design.

This paper will present the modeling of electronic products with Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), especially for appliances in cars. The so called Generic Module based LCA enables the user to model nearly every electronic products, each relating to their respective manufacturing phases. A short introduction to the method will be underlined by several examples. From the co-operation with industry partners outcomes of multi-client studies will be shown. The LCA results of electronic car appliances (combined sensors and actuators) take into consideration the manufacturing phase, the use phase according to interactions between the electronic systems and the car’s use phase and finally the assessment of an End of Life (EoL) alternative for the appliance.