How much energy is used?
The Energy criterion examines the total energy consumption of your product across its full life cycle, including manufacture, distribution, use, and end of life.
A strong answer quantifies energy use across the life cycle, identifies the stages that consume the most energy, and demonstrates that design choices have been made to minimise consumption at those stages. Where energy is consumed in use, it considers the source of that energy and how the product could be designed to work with renewable sources. A weak answer considers only the use-phase energy or ignores manufacture and logistics entirely.
Energy is one of the most direct links between product design and carbon emissions. For many product categories, manufacture is the dominant energy-consuming phase; for others, it is the use phase over a long lifetime. Understanding which stage dominates for your product is the first step to reducing the overall energy profile.
