UML presentation of a conceptual green design control system to react to environmental requirements

Environmental issues have caught the attention of environmental organizations and aroused concern all over the world. In an effort to prevent the growth of environmental hazards, international legislation on environmental protection has advanced accordingly. USA, Japan, and countries in Europe have been among the first to recognize the need for a commitment to environmental protection, with the European Union being the most active. The European Union implemented the RoHS directive (Restriction of Hazardous Substances) in July 2006. This legislation has had a great impact on the electronics and information technology industries. In responding to consumer needs and the call for environmental protection, electronic products can no longer be designed exclusively in a function-oriented way. Poor control of products' environmental hazards may lead to problems in areas such as supplier selection, establishment of control standards during production, and the quality of the finished product. Thus, taking into account a products' potential threat to the environment in its design has become a mainstream practice. Against this background, this paper adopts the RoHS as the starting point and discusses how a green design control system is conceptually developed with the aim of achieving effective control over a product's life cycle. The use case view and process view, which are parts of the Unified Modeling Language, are applied to demonstrate the workflow and control function of a green design control system. Finally, by means of data model analysis and the design of a user interface, this paper presents a reference model for future implementation.