cradle to cradle remaking the way we make things

This vision of upcycling is based on a system of 'lifecycle development' initiated by Braungart and colleagues at the Environmental Protection Encouragement Agency in the 1990s: after products have reached the end of their useful life, they become either 'biological nutrients' or 'technical nutrients'. The book discourages downcycling, but rather encourages the manufacture of products with the goal of upcycling in mind. It suggests that the ' reduce reuse recycle' methods perpetuate this cradle-to-grave strategy, and that more changes need to be made.

It calls for a radical change in industry: a switch from a cradle-to-grave pattern to a cradle-to-cradle pattern. It is a manifesto detailing how to achieve their Cradle to Cradle Design model. Products might be designed so that, after their useful life, they provide nourishment for something new-either as 'biological nutrients' that safely re-enter the environment or as 'technical nutrients' that circulate within closed-loop industrial cycles, without being 'downcycled' into low-grade uses (as most 'recyclables' now are).Įlaborating their principles from experience (re)designing everything from carpeting to corporate campuses, the authors make an exciting and viable case for change.Ī manifesto for a radically different philosophy and practice of manufacture and environmentalism.Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things is a 2002 non-fiction book by German chemist Michael Braungart and US architect William McDonough. In fact, why not take nature itself as our model? A tree produces thousands of blossoms in order to create another tree, yet we do not consider its abundance wasteful but safe, beautiful, and highly effective hence, 'waste equals food' is the first principle the book sets forth. Why not challenge the notion that human industry must inevitably damage the natural world, they ask. As William McDonough and Michael Braungart argue in their provocative, visionary book, however, this approach perpetuates a one-way, 'cradle to grave' manufacturing model that dates to the Industrial Revolution and casts off as much as 90 percent of the materials it uses as waste, much of it toxic. 'Reduce, reuse, recycle' urge environmentalists in other words, do more with less in order to minimize damage.

Cradle to cradle remaking the way we make things