Towards the Design-driven Carbon Footprint reduction of Composite Aerospace and Automotive components: An overview 2024-37-0032

Composite materials, pioneered by aerospace engineering due to their lightweight, strength, and durability properties, are increasingly adopted in the high-performance automotive sector. Besides the acknowledged composite components’ performance, enabled lightweighting is becoming even more crucial for energy efficiency, and therefore emissions along vehicle use phase from a decarbonization perspective. However, their use entails energy-intensive and polluting processes involved in raw material production, in manufacturing processes, and, in particular, in end-of-life disposal. Carbon footprint is the established indicator to assess the environmental impact of climate-changing factors on products or services. Research on different carbon footprint sources reduction is increasing, and even the European Composites Industry Association is demanding the development of specific Design for Sustainability approaches. This paper analyzes the early strategies for providing low-carbon aerospace and automotive composite components “by design”. The goal is to enable design approaches of components considering the life cycle of the material from product and process design, material selection, and fabrication, to use end eventual recycling and reuse. The investigation is structured including the design approaches and tools, and the aspects concerning ultimate trends of materials development, shapes generation, and manufacturing processes. Among these, it discusses the potential role of emerging technologies such as digital intelligence, biocomposites, biomicry, generative AI, and additive manufacturing. The aim is to identify the framework of possible drivers for Design for Sustainability approaches rethinking lightweight products lifecycles and highlight the resulting challenges and future developments. The conclusive remarks discuss the advantages and disadvantages of the design drivers and the need for assessment and validation through vehicle Life Cycle Assessment approaches.