Cultures of Sustainability: ‘Ways of doing’ cooking

In our research, we have been expanding our conceptual and methodological frames of reference as designers, in order to explore the complexity of factors involved in environmental sustainability and the consequent challenges posed for design research. In this paper, we discuss some of these issues in user-centered and sustainable design, drawing out and developing relations to concepts from other fields of study, such as the sociology of consumption and material culture. In order to better understand the role that (sustainable) design products might play within people’s everyday lives and lifestyles, we interpret and discuss notions of ‘socio-cultural practices’ of consumption and frame an approach to studying people’s ‘ways of doing’ with artifacts. We point to two examples from our previous research on designing for energy awareness and for sustainable bathing practices. A current study is presented in depth, in which families and singles, resident in The Netherlands but originating from different countries, have been observed and interviewed during preparation of a meal, eating and clearing up afterwards. Through studying and reflecting on the different ‘ways of doing’ cooking, we gained insights into how cooking and a range of associated practices and artifacts are deeply embedded in traditions, meanings and aspirations. Issues of environmental consumption, such as water, energy and waste, are at stake in such design research but, as we argue, so is attention and sensitivity to how these are interwoven in meaningful socio-cultural practices. The setup and findings are presented, as a point of departure for raising conceptual and methodological questions to be developed in future work

BALANCING FOOD VALUES: MAKING SUSTAINABLE CHOICES WITHIN COOKING PRACTICES

Within user-centred design and topics such as persuasive design, pleasurable products, and design for sustainable behaviour, there is a danger of over-determining, pacifying or reducing people’s diversity. Taking the case of sustainable food, we have looked into the social aspects of cooking at home, in specific related to the type of food that is purchased. This paper describes what it means for people to make more sustainable choices in food shopping and how that can be mediated while taking different ‘food values’ that household members have into account. In a design experiment, we developed a service for selecting daily dinner meals while supporting choices of sustainable food which reported on environmental impact, health and nutrition values, and purchase data. Through visualizations of alternative food choices, the experiment provided a space for households to negotiate food values, while opening up possibilities for changing cooking practices

Challenges in Energy Awareness: a Swedish case of heating consumption in households

An efficient and sustainable energy system is an important factor when minimising the environmental impact caused by the cities. We have worked with questions on how to construct a more direct connection between customers-­‐citizens and a provider of district heating for negotiating notions of comfort in relation to heating and hot tap water use. In this paper we present visualisation concepts of such connections and reflect on the outcomes in terms of the type of data needed for sustainability assessment, as well as the methods explored for channelling information on individual consumption and environmental impact between customers and the provider of district heating. We have defined challenges in sustainable design for consumer behaviour change in the case of reducing heat and hot water consumption in individual households: (1) The problematic relation between individual behaviour steering and system level district heating, (2) The complexity of environmental impact as indicator for behaviour change, and (3) Ethical considerations concerning the role of the designer

Investigative Designing: usage-oriented research in and through designing

In this paper, we discuss the practice of investigative designing. The notion is currently being used to denote a variety of ideas in design research, and we first seek to clarify some of them. We then present our own, specific take on this notion, while acknowledging that it is being used broadly. We adopted the notion as an umbrella term for our combined research and design activities: as investigative designers. We use it for the exploration of how designers can integrate designing and researching within a design process. The two main concerns we are pursuing within this are to clarify the role of a designer with research skills, and to explore the implications of a usage orientation in design. We present two studies in this paper in which we investigated how usage research for design can be specifically geared to the needs of design, and what helps designers (and what does not) in designing with usage information. In the first study, we ourselves conducted usage research, developed design ideas on the basis of that, and reflected on this process. In the second study, we observed how three other designers engaged with the same user data and developed design ideas. Our findings include that the designers tended to prefer to develop their own design ideas independently from the data, only checking or adapting the ideas to the data. Furthermore, the capacity of designers for dealing with data needs to be taken into consideration. Lastly, the form of data presentation influences how well designers can engage with it in designing. Keywords: Investigative Design; Designing; Designer; Product Usage; User Research</p

Sustainability assessments of commercial urban agriculture – a scoping review

The field of urban agriculture has seen an increase in development and attention in recent years, with a large share of literature addressing whether urban agriculture may pose a solution for food insecurity and combat environmental impacts. However, few studies have examined the many sustainability claims of urban agriculture systems, especially for urban farms intended for larger output and commercial ends. In this study, we analyze sustainability assessments of urban agriculture for commercial implementation. We do this by exploring the methods employed for conducting sustainability analyses, outlining the different urban agriculture cultivation systems, analyzing which sustainability aspects are considered, looking into what the sustainability analyses conclude, and studying how authors anticipate the knowledge gained from their sustainability assessments can be used. Environmental aspects of sustainability were more often assessed than other sustainability aspects, and LCA research practice was used for the majority of environmental assessments. Some studies compared the environmental benefits of different types of urban agriculture systems, but this was not conclusive overall as to what systems would be more environmentally beneficial. This suggests that urban agriculture’s sustainability cannot be universally categorized but should be assessed in relation to specific environmental conditions and urban contexts. Future research should aim to develop more nuanced frameworks for evaluating the environmental, social, economic and governance impacts of urban agriculture

Potential för ökad återanvändning i Södertälje kommun

Den här studien har tittat både på potentialen för återanvändning i Södertälje kommun och på hinder och möjligheter som finns för att öka återanvändningen samt kommunens roll för att uppnå den potentialen. Rapporten är framtagen som underlag till Södertälje kommuns handlingsplan för ökad återanvändning

A social practice perspective on the smart grid

Abstract—This is a summary of the workshop that was held as part of the ICT4S conference with a focus on the topic of social practices and smart grids. Here we present an overview of the five invited paper contributions to the workshop, as well as a summary of the plenary discussion, and our final conclusions

Policylab for reuse of take away packaging

Syftet med detta projekt som är finansierat av Naturvårdsverket, har varit att dels kartlägga vilka hinder och möjligheter som finns för att öka återanvändning av take away-förpackningar för mat och dryck, samt dels utforska vilka policyåtgärder som kan användas för att hantera hindren och öka möjligheterna för en omställning. Rapporten lyfter tretton policyåtgärder som föreslagits av branschföreträdare som i sin helhet ska betraktas som möjliga lösningar för olika problem och typer av aktörer, eftersom ingen helhetslösning finns. Efter en prioritering lyfter rapporten fram fyra förslag, vilka har analyserats ytterligare i en konsekvensanalys: Att använda offentlig upphandling som styrmedel, att göra det dyrare för konsumenter att köpa och använda engångsförpackningar samt att genomföra kommunikationsinsatser riktade till konsumenter är de förslag som flest ser som pådrivande. Även fler tester och pilotförsök skulle ha en betydande effekt för att driva på utvecklingen. The purpose of this project, which is funded by the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency, has been to map what obstacles and opportunities exist to increase the reuse of take away packaging for food and drink, and to explore what policy measures can be used to deal with the obstacles and increase the opportunities for a changeover.The report highlights thirteen policy measures proposed by industry representatives which, in their entirety, should be considered as possible solutions for different problems and types of actors, since there is no one-size-fits-all solution. After a prioritization, the report highlights four proposals, which have been further analyzed in an impact analysis: Using public procurement as a policy instrument, making it more expensive for consumers to buy and use disposable packaging and implementing communication efforts aimed at consumers are the proposals that most people see as driving . Even more tests and pilot trials would have a significant effect in driving development

Cultures of Sustainability: ‘Ways of doing’ cooking

In our research, we have been expanding our conceptual and methodological frames of reference as designers, in order to explore the complexity of factors involved in environmental sustainability and the consequent challenges posed for design research. In this paper, we discuss some of these issues in user-centered and sustainable design, drawing out and developing relations to concepts from other fields of study, such as the sociology of consumption and material culture. In order to better understand the role that (sustainable) design products might play within people’s everyday lives and lifestyles, we interpret and discuss notions of ‘socio-cultural practices’ of consumption and frame an approach to studying people’s ‘ways of doing’ with artifacts. We point to two examples from our previous research on designing for energy awareness and for sustainable bathing practices. A current study is presented in depth, in which families and singles, resident in The Netherlands but originating from different countries, have been observed and interviewed during preparation of a meal, eating and clearing up afterwards. Through studying and reflecting on the different ‘ways of doing’ cooking, we gained insights into how cooking and a range of associated practices and artifacts are deeply embedded in traditions, meanings and aspirations. Issues of environmental consumption, such as water, energy and waste, are at stake in such design research but, as we argue, so is attention and sensitivity to how these are interwoven in meaningful socio-cultural practices. The setup and findings are presented, as a point of departure for raising conceptual and methodological questions to be developed in future work.Designing Social InnovationForms of SustainabilitySustainable ways of livin