Ethical Issues in the Design of Ultra-Lightweight Vehicles
Author(s):
Missy Cummings, Anke Von Gorp
A multidisciplinary design team consisting of undergraduate
and graduate students from Aerospace Engineering, Applied Earth
Sciences, Industrial Design and Mechanical Engineering at the
Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands is designing
a lightweight, sustainable car. 1 Their goal is to design a family car
with a maximum mass of 400 kg. Mass is an important factor in
the fuel consumption of a car, a light car can be very energy
efficient. The target mass is less than half of that of normal
cars. (European family cars usually weigh about 1200 kg and the
average American car weighs 1360 kg). Another requirement is
that the car should be manufactured at affordable mass
production costs. 2
The design of such a unique car presents not only
significant technical hurdles, but it also introduces many
ethical issues such as minimum safety requirements and the need
to incorporate sustainability considerations. This web-based
case study will present the major safety and sustainability
points in the ethical debate over ultra-lightweight vehicles
and then ask the reader to consider a series of
thought-provoking questions for both topics. For those using
this website for an assignment, you have the option of sending
your responses to your professor or teaching assistant.
In addition to reading and responding to the ethical issues
in the design of ultra-lightweight vehicles, interested readers
can see how the answers to both sets of questions from a sample
of students from the United States compared to those of Dutch
students. The case study was piloted in a Technology and Ethics
class comprised of engineering students from various
disciplines at the University of Virginia as well as a group of
students in Aerospace Engineering at Delft University of
Technology. While many answers were very similar between the
two distinctly different student groups, many attitudes are
quite different. Educators using this case may want to add an
additional question to the assignment that asks students
hypothesize why answers between the two groups of engineering
students may be similar or different.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank the DutchEVO design team for their
cooperation. This research was sponsored by an NSF grant
(#0135585) for the Online Ethics Center under the direction of
Caroline Whitbeck.
Footnotes
Pictures courtesy of the DutchEVO.
Cite this page:
Missy Cummings, Anke Von Gorp
"Ethical Issues in the Design of Ultra-Lightweight Vehicles"
Online Ethics Center for Engineering
2/27/2006 8:27:17 PM
National Academy of Engineering
Accessed: Friday, November 21, 2008
<www.onlineethics.org/CMS/enviro/enviroessays/ULV.aspx>