Integrating Eco-design and PLM in the Aviation Completion Industry: A Case Study

Aviation represents 12% of the CO2 emissions from all transport sources in the world. These pollutants are even stronger in their impact because they are released at high altitudes. Therefore, aeronautical companies have adopted the eco-design and PLM perspective to integrate the environmental concerns into the development of their products. PLM permits to include the environmental matters into every phase of the development process, not forgetting traditional arguments such as function, costs, production and aesthetics. Research regarding ecologically concerned textiles in aviation completion industry is not available in literature, especially those regarding its whole lifecycle and supply chain. Therefore, this paper aims to analyse this unexplored concern by assessing the integration of eco-design and PLM perspective for the use of textile materials in this industry sector. Through a case study, the research team explored the completion function of a north-American company in general and, specifically, the use of textile materials for internal completion of the aircraft. Even though representing 1% of the total weight of the aircraft, textiles represent an important factor in the composition of an airplane and the fact that it is being thought off as another recyclable and not disposable part of it should mean a shift in the perception of its growing importance in the development of the plane as a whole.