Eco-design in Robotics

The fight against climate change has become a priority in the European Union and in many countries around the world, as demonstrated at COP 21 to 23. In order to contribute to this fight, the European Council adopted the "20-20-20 targets" in 2008:

• reduce our greenhouse gas emissions by 20% by 2020 ;

• reduce our energy consumption by 20% by 2020;

• have an energy mix based on 20% renewable energies by 2020.

The objective for the first two items is even to achieve a 40% reduction in greenhouse gases and 27% less energy consumption by 2030.

Such objectives cannot be achieved without the collaboration of governments and industry. However, with the crisis of the late 2000s, the industry had to fight for survival against low-cost labor countries. In order to withstand this crisis, the industry has tried :

1. to innovate;

2. robotize in order to avoid relocation, or even to relocate companies within Europe.

Robotizing is partly contradictory to the climate change agenda. Indeed, in 2016, according to the International federation of robotics (IFR), the global operational stock of industrial robots was around 1,800,000 units. According to the same data, 294,000 industrial robots and 60,000 professional service robots were sold worldwide. Experts estimate an annual increase in sales of around 15% for the 2018-2020 period. However, as we shall see in this article, using robots has a major impact on the environment.

Over and above these figures, given that robots are clearly becoming an increasingly important part of our lives, it's important to think about their eco-design as far upstream as possible if we want to continue to develop our robotics activities in a sustainable way.

This article therefore looks at the environmental impact of robots, and the ways in which these impacts can be reduced. It is divided into three main sections:

1. the first gives a brief overview of ecodesign in general and the associated tools, then looks at the environmental impact factors of a robot. Two broad classes of techniques for reducing certain environmental impacts of robots are highlighted:

   • techniques for reducing energy consumption,

   • replacement of robot bodies with parts made from materials with low environmental impact.

2. The second section details the most common approaches to reducing the energy consumption of robots:

   • techniques for balancing...