ABSTRACT
This chapter provides insights on sustainability and energy efficiency of manufacturing processes. First, sustainability of conventional manufacturing is presented in three aspects: framework, energy and life cycle assessment (LCA)-based studies. Sustainable production focuses on efficiency optimization with minimization of environmental effects coupled with resource optimization. Among several unconventional manufacturing processes, the sustainability aspects of three processes — electrochemical machining, electric discharge machining and ultrasonic machining are discussed. Distributed manufacturing based on open-source 3D printers had the scope with lesser environmental impact than traditional manufacturing for product variants. The chapters details the sustainability of additive manufacturing processes from the viewpoint of LCA and energy evaluation. It discusses the scope of design for additive manufacturing (DFAM) and DFAM guidelines. Additive manufacturing can develop various feature types and induce various constraints than other production processes. A design guideline is segmented into three parts: process characteristics, design principles and design rules.
