DESIGNING FOR A SUSTAINABLE FUTURE is a day devoted to applying sustainable design ideas to software initiatives. Our initial focus will be on the areas of research, synthesis, experience design, and interaction design, but participants will take the conversation from there to formulate something truly inspiring and practical.

We welcome participants from industry, government, and education who are involved with strategy, planning, ideation, ethnography, synthesis, design, construction, and collaboration, whether in theory or in practice.

The workshop takes place all day on October 27, 2009, during the Creativity & Cognition Conference at UC Berkeley. Organizers come from SAP, Parc, Jump Associates, Indiana State University, and Catabolic Design.

Design Agenda

Leaders in the field will speak throughout the day, to help facilitate forums and exercises that we hope will challenge and inspire you. By the end of the day you will generate a design agenda that will describe the responsibilities we bear, cradle to grave, for what we choose to make.

Topics will ultimately be chosen by you, but candidates include the following:

• Sustainable design theory and practice. What concepts, practices, ethics, principles, methods, and case studies can we share which demonstrate effective and practical ecologic design work?
• Natural resources. How must our assumptions and practices change to make responsible use of energy, water, and precious materials? How can the results of our design work encourage similarly positive behavior?
• Society. How can our practices—and our designs—encourage meaningful human interaction and correct matters of social disparity?
• Business. How can we amplify intelligence and divert bad decisions as we collaborate with executives, managers, and others to design and operate businesses that offer sufficient profits without doing violence to other values?
• Healthcare. How can our research, synthesis, and design efforts help create a sensible healthcare system that provides everyone with the best care available, that improves treatment outcomes, and that drives costs downward?
• Food. How can our work ensure that everyone benefits from agriculture, that our land remains bountiful, that people are well-nourished, and that the health of ecosystems aren’t imperiled in the process?
• Transportation. What can transportation systems, services, and products yield greater efficiencies, comfort, and economy?

Participate! 

If these challenges interest you, and you’d like to contribute to the growing intellectual commons on sustainable design, please: