Exploring the transformative role of technology, from environmental respect to active regeneration, in an interview with Simona Maschi.
As technology advances at an exponential rate, shattering existing boundaries daily, the essence of future innovation lies in crafting technology that proposes sustainable solutions to ensure a better world.
This innovative approach fosters scenarios based on regeneration, enhancing the quality of life for all beings on our planet. By using digital tools, it is possible to paint a picture of a future where the realms of design and technology synergize to nurture the ecosystem.
Today we’re surfing with Simona Maschi, CEO and co-founder of Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design.
What do you think technology’s role is in tackling environmental issues?
Technology’s role in confronting environmental challenges is paramount, providing us with invaluable tools for sustainable progress. Its primary function is data management—gathering, analyzing, and synthesizing information to illuminate the nuances of our ecological predicament. This insight spans broad trends down to granular specifics, like using sensors to precisely measure a home’s energy or water consumption. Such detailed data is pivotal for full comprehension of environmental concerns.
Beyond data, digital technology has revolutionized communication, expediting, and enhancing scientific discourse and information exchange in unprecedented ways. This communicative power has fostered collaborative research, crystallizing the reality of crises such as climate change—not only within scientific circles but extending to the public realm. Social media, in particular, has been transformative, catalyzing environmental awareness and spurring a sense of urgency for both entities and individuals to embrace a green agenda.
In the quest for sustainability, technology is instrumental in fostering a shift towards a share-based economy over traditional ownership models. Echoing Jeremy Rifkin’s vision in “The Age of Access”, there exists a more collective, less consumerist approach to product consumption. This new paradigm, enabled by digital platforms, facilitates communal access to services and goods, suggesting a hefty reliance on technology to coordinate this sharing economy effectively. This concept transcends utopian ideology, already taking root in practices like music streaming and car-sharing, demonstrating a tangible drift towards more sustainable consumption patterns.
Such strategies, by promoting shared usage over personal ownership, offer promising avenues for reducing energy use and other environmental footprints, showcasing how technology not only diagnoses but also helps to remedy our ecological challenges.
How can we ensure that technological innovations do not further harm the environment?
To safeguard our environment from the potentially harmful impact of technological innovations, it is crucial to embrace a holistic approach that transcends the traditional concept of sustainability. In a world inundated with formidable challenges such as war, poverty, and a lack of inclusivity, the mere preservation of the status quo proves inadequate. Our ambitions should be directed towards regeneration—a comprehensive process that not only involves the mindful utilization of existing resources for new creations but also emphasizes active contributions to the ecosystem’s revival. This contribution extends beyond mere economic or material gains, incorporating significant social values.
Within this framework, digital technologies emerge as vital catalysts. They provide a unique opportunity to expedite the development of future-oriented scenarios, products, and services, thereby streamlining the innovation pathway while reducing the reliance on physical resources. Diverging from the conventional product development cycles, which necessitate complete development followed by market testing, digital innovations facilitate iterative experimentation and enhancements during the design phase. The advent of digitalization and instantaneous data processing permits direct engagement with end-users, enabling the incorporation of real-time feedback to tailor offerings more effectively to public demand and expectations.
Such transformative interaction dynamics have heralded the advent of the prosumer—a consumer who actively contributes to the creation process, thereby blurring the historically rigid lines between consumers and producers. This collaborative model, which saw one of its earliest and most notable implementations within the Linux community, optimizes resource allocation and paves the way for technological solutions that not only meet societal demands more effectively but also champion the cause of environmental rejuvenation.
Embracing these guiding principles ensures that technological advances serve as a potent force towards fostering a more equitable and restorative future. Here, progress is achieved in consonance with the planet’s well-being, leveraging innovation for mutual benefit rather than at the expense of our environment.
Which cutting-edge technologies do you consider most promising in driving environmental sustainability forward?
Among the emerging technologies with the greatest potential for environmental sustainability, artificial intelligence with its subset of machine learning, and blockchain stand out.
Artificial Intelligence is particularly promising for its ability to make accurate predictions about energy and resource consumption, thereby optimizing the provision of services in sectors such as mobility, hospitality, airports, and healthcare. This optimization of consumption allows for the reduction of waste and orients consumer behaviors towards more eco-sustainable practices. For example, by suggesting the optimal time to travel or to use appliances, it directly contributes to reducing environmental impact.
Blockchain, however, offers significant contributions to the transparency of supply chains, ensuring product traceability and facilitating informed choices by consumers. Being able to follow the journey, from production to consumption, of what we eat, or wear promotes greater corporate and personal responsibility, supporting a model of circular economy.
Alongside these technologies, a tremendous responsibility falls on industries, requiring a radical change in production processes, resource management, distribution, and maintenance of products, up to their end-of-life recovery. Environmental sustainability implies that every company is responsible not only for the quality of its product but also for its post-consumption lifecycle.
Lastly, despite the significant influence of industries, the role of individuals and their daily impact on the environment cannot be overlooked. Environmentally irresponsible behaviors are not always a choice but often stem from a lack of awareness or knowledge on how to act. Here, mobile technologies and apps come into play, acting as extensions of our cognitive and practical capacities, offering useful information, advice, and data that can guide individuals towards more sustainable behaviors.
Is it possible for interaction design to encourage users towards adopting more sustainable behaviors?
Interaction design can effectively promote more sustainable behaviors among users. Essentially designing artifacts—items that do not naturally exist—it extends its influence beyond simply creating objects to also shaping human interactions with these objects.
Historically, design focused on tangible materials such as wood, iron, and stone. However, the rise of digital technologies has dramatically reshaped the field, introducing a new paradigm. Interaction design not only focuses on crafting objects but also aims to orchestrate and predict interactions between humans and digital systems.
This evolution has greatly expanded the scope of design, enabling it to affect daily user habits through interactive devices and services. For instance, automated check-in systems at airports do more than streamline the process; they also promote behaviors that reduce environmental impact by decreasing paper use and unnecessary travel.
The design process in interaction design is critical. It involves prototyping and user testing, fostering continual dialogue between designers and users. This interaction ensures that products not only meet practical requirements but also encourage conscious and responsible engagements. During prototyping, user feedback is essential and can lead to modifications in features to better meet sustainability goals.
Car sharing serves as a tangible example. Once considered a premature innovation, it is now a cornerstone of sustainable urban mobility. This system does more than just reduce the number of vehicles on the road—it transforms individual relationships with car ownership and utilization, guiding users towards more sustainable practices. During initial trials of this service over 15 years ago in Italy and England, users identified significant, unexpected social benefits. The requirement to pick up a car near, but not directly in front of, one’s home allowed users to explore new areas of their neighborhood. Furthermore, car-pooling enabled residents to meet and connect with neighbors who shared similar daily routes. The profound social impact of new technologies and their ability to enhance people’s lives cannot be overlooked.
What defines sustainability in the realm of design and innovation?
Sustainability in design and innovation heralds a significant paradigm shift, elevating the concept beyond mere conservation of resources to embrace the principle of regeneration fully. This forward-thinking approach demands a shift away from a traditional economy predicated on the extraction of natural and human resources, toward a visionary economic model that champions the regeneration of our global ecosystem. This model is not just about maintaining value but actively creating a surplus of value in every endeavor.
In today’s world, adopting sustainability practices is not merely an option but a globally acknowledged imperative. Driven by mounting social pressures and stringent international regulations, corporations and institutions have come to the realization that practices detrimental to the environment not only threaten the natural world but also pose a considerable risk to their long-term commercial viability.
The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) provide a crucial strategic framework for navigating this transition, pinpointing global needs that, when addressed through innovation, have the potential to cultivate entirely new markets. The SDGs not only highlight the vital challenges that need to be tackled but also motivate companies to embrace novel business models that promise profitability as well as sustainability. Achieving this necessitates a deep commitment to innovative practices and a creative approach to design, underpinned by a willingness to prototype and a readiness for transformative change.
Progressing from sustainability to regeneration requires confronting systemic issues, from enhancing sustainable mobility to combating obesity. These complex challenges call for solutions that surpass the reach of any single organization. They necessitate a systemic, collaborative methodology, wherein design assumes a pivotal role in weaving together comprehensive solutions that engage a diverse array of stakeholders.
Authentic sustainable innovation is, therefore, characterized by its inclusive approach, uniting various entities within the system, including those companies that have traditionally viewed each other as rivals. This collaborative co-design process unfolds new avenues to expedite progress towards a more just society, wherein innovation transcends marginal enhancements, aiming instead for profound, systemic shifts in business models, value creation, and cooperative efforts to achieve shared objectives.
At its core, the shift from sustainability to regeneration in the realm of design and innovation calls for a deep-rooted reevaluation of how we conceptualize products and services. It places a premium on devising solutions that are not only innovative but also address the multifaceted environmental, social, and economic challenges facing our global community.
What standout projects from CIID students have made significant strides in advancing environmental sustainability?
Collaborating with Ikea, we have conceptualized domestic sustainability models anchored in the transparency and palpability of consumption data. Our intention is to catalyze a shift from mere awareness to substantive measures that enhance our ecological impact. Our investigations centered on demystifying everyday resource use, thereby illuminating its environmental repercussions. A significant hurdle entails identifying which daily practices to alter and the methodology, as the invisible energy cost of routine actions often eludes us.
Take, for instance, items sidelined by obsolescence; these possessions hold potential for a renewed existence via another’s interest. Here, the challenge pivots around facilitating the handover or sale of such items, a process usually burdened by significant logistical demands.
Responding to this challenge, we have envisioned a system wherein objects, imbued with a metaphorical “digital soul,” independently signal the right moment to transition to new stewardship. Anchored by a digital platform that conjures an interactive landscape akin to Google Maps, articles broadcast their availability, nudging potential custodians into action. Through augmented reality, one strolling down a lane might engage with the platform via smartphone, visualizing and connecting with articles primed for repurposing. The platform streamlines the exchange between the original owners and prospective users, enhancing logistical efficiency while easing the associated burden.
One engaging initiative was the development of an interactive artwork that embodies the user’s personal energy and water consumption patterns. At a cursory glance, this artwork masquerades as a conventional decorative piece. However, it boasts a dynamic feature that transforms its visual representation in alignment with the user’s consumption levels. Utilizing a color palette where red and blue signify energy for heating/cooling and water usage respectively, the artwork dynamically shifts its hues and vibrancy. Should there be an uptick in consumption, the piece gradually sheds its vibrancy, serving as a visceral reminder of the personal and planetary impacts of our consumption habits. This project is designed to foster a deeper understanding and appreciation of sustainable habits through a fusion of art and environmental consciousness, making the concept of resource consumption both visually engaging and highly intuitive.
Another innovation is a smart shower system that intelligently monitors real-time water usage. This system is ingeniously integrated with an intuitive lighting feedback mechanism attached to the shower faucet. It is designed to alert users as they approach their average water consumption level, with a gentle light signal activating shortly before the threshold is reached, prompting a consideration to conclude water usage. This encourages a reduction in consumption. Adopting an educative rather than punitive approach, this shower aims to subtly influence users towards making more mindful and sustainable daily decisions, ensuring comfort is not compromised in the pursuit of environmental stewardship.
Furthermore, we embarked on a collaborative journey with Volvo to engineer a groundbreaking automobile model, meticulously designed for the nuances of the Chinese market. This venture was strategically focused on addressing the unique needs of a specific demographic cohort: individuals in their forties who have been shaped by the One Child Policy. These singular heirs, emblematic of their generation, confront intense pressures stemming from dual responsibilities—caring for both aging parents and children, all while navigating the demands of professional life in a nuanced socio-cultural landscape.
Our comprehensive investigation into the day-to-day lives of these individuals, with a special emphasis on their driving habits, unveiled the indispensable role of the automobile as a sanctuary of personal freedom and relaxation in the midst of the region’s notorious traffic congestion. Within the confines of their vehicles, they enjoy a rare reprieve, indulging in their preferred tunes and momentarily dissociating from life’s demands. This revelation not only underscored their acute consciousness of the dire air pollution levels afflicting Chinese metropolises like Shanghai but also their earnest aspiration to actively partake in environmental stewardship.
In response to these identified preferences and concerns, we introduced a cutting-edge navigation system that goes beyond merely offering the quickest or shortest route; it suggests the “greenest” path based on air quality. Opting for this alternative might modestly extend travel durations, yet it empowers our users to navigate through zones of significantly improved air quality. This choice fosters both personal wellbeing and environmental conservation, facilitating a more balanced distribution of urban traffic.
This endeavor signifies a trifecta of victories—enriching Volvo, its clientele, and the broader environment. It is a testament to the understanding that direct requests or legal mandates alone are insufficient to shift consumer behavior towards more sustainable practices. Instead, it’s the allure of an enhanced experience that can persuade individuals to adopt eco-friendlier habits.
How is Artificial Intelligence redefining the landscape of design?
Leonardo da Vinci once stated that technology should serve to diminish human toil, a principle I believe remains profoundly relevant and should steer our decision-making processes today.
The domain of design isn’t solely governed by creativity; AI is reshaping and will persistently influence the way we collect and analyze user data, granting designers a deeper insight into the explicit and implicit needs of individuals. This, in turn, empowers the creation of highly tailored solutions. Yet, the influence of AI extends beyond this facet. Compliance with ever-changing regulations across different countries stands as a pivotal element in product development—a challenge AI tackles with superior efficiency.
This capability dramatically enhances our ability to customize and localize products and services, enabling the transition from marketing a product in a solitary market to offering globally versatile products that adhere to the diverse regulations of each country. For instance, the stringent and varied regulations governing medical devices or a check-in system across different locales.
Moreover, consider the profound acceleration AI introduces to the testing and prototyping stages. AI’s involvement drastically speeds up the validation of design assumptions, affecting not just the product’s components and functionality but also economic and regulatory aspects.
These insights are also a product of my dialogue and collaboration with Ezio Manzini, a luminary in environmental and social sustainability. Through our three-decade partnership, we have envisioned and crafted innovative solutions aimed at fostering a lifestyle that is both more sustainable and eco-conscious.
Simona Maschi is a co-founder and CEO of the Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design. Leading the overall organization at CIID she heads a team that encompasses a world-class consultancy, education program and a research lab.
She studied at the Polytechnic University of Milan, where she completed both her PhD in Industrial Design and Multimedia Communication and her MA in Architecture. Simona is an expert in service design, scenario design and design methods and is passionate about design solutions that create a positive impact on the world.
Widely respected in industry, Simona regularly speaks at conferences and events, bringing inspiration on how people centered design can create new and reinforce existing innovation paths. She is a member of the jury for the IXDA Interaction Awards 2014 and part of a board of experts implementing new design strategies at the University of Macau in China.
