The objective of this proposal is to establish the feasibility of developing an integrated decision support framework that transforms the current time-consuming and reactive (post completion of final design) sustainability assessment into a proactive CAE approach that enables the ability to revise designs based on performance against selected sustainability targets in the product design process, i.e., enables design optimization for sustainability. This framework, called Sustainability CAE (SCAE) will leverage the latest advancements in open standards and software capabilities, capture lifecycle-wide information relevant to sustainability and its assessment and organize and integrate it in a usable form with the analysis phases. In this phase 1 project, we shall focus on: (a) requirements analysis to determine the constituents of information for CAE analysis, (b) the formalization of integrated data models to describe how data should be stored, linked, and accessed and interoperated with design activities, and (c) a proof of concept prototype for the demonstration of the utility of the information model for CAE with goal of analyzing sustainability. Commercial Applications: By integrating sustainability targets and status of information with the existing product creation information, our framework Sustainability CAE (SCAE) will deliver a one-stop access to structured, real-time information. The availability of this information in a timely and accurate manner, in turn, will enable the development of value-added, vertically specialized tools for activities such as material usage monitoring, energy monitoring and recyclability analysis. The holistic management of sustainability would be possible because now sustainability can be managed as a vehicle attribute from both business and functional perspectives. This project will develop tools and information models to define, access and manage sustainability metrics during product development phases involving analysis and simulation, which will enable major OEMs and key Full Service Suppliers (FSS) to truly manage sustainability as a key product attribute. The development of predictive analytical tools to assess sustainability metrics is a focus of this project and this has been identified as a significant shortcoming at Ford and other OEMs
