PRODUCT LIFECYCLE SUSTAINABILITY SCORE TRACKING AND INDICIA

• US 20100274629A1
• Filed: 04/24/2009
• Published: 10/28/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 04/24/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Rockwell Automation Technologies Incorporated (Allen-Bradley Co., Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Rockwell Automation Technologies Incorporated (Allen-Bradley Co., Inc.)
• Inventors: Walker, Marcia Elaine, Kaufman, Philip John
• Granted Patent: US 10,013,666 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/10
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06375 Prediction of business process outcome or impact based on a proposed change
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/087 Inventory or stock management, e.g. order filling, procurement or balancing against orders
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/30 Administration of product recycling or disposal
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0201 Market modelling; Market analysis; Collecting market data
• CPC Class Codes: Y02W 90/00 Enabling technologies or technologies with a potential or indirect contribution to greenhouse gas [GHG] emissions mitigation

Abstract

The claimed subject matter relates to an architecture that can facilitate sustainability monitoring and indicia thereof for a product over the course of the entire lifecycle of the product. In particular, the architecture can acquire a status update associated with a state of the product. Based upon the state, the architecture can determine an impact of that state to a sustainability score associated with the product.

Claims

1. A system that facilitates sustainability tracking in connection with a manufactured good, comprising:

an acquisition component configured to receive a status update associated with a state of a manufactured product;

an analysis component configured to determine an impact value to a lifecycle sustainability score associated with the product based upon the status update; and

an archival component configured to employ a product ID that pertains to the product to access a data store and to update the lifecycle sustainability score maintained by the data store with the impact value.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the status update pertains to at least one of operation of all or a portion of the product, modification of all or a portion of the product, maintenance of all or a portion of the product, transfer, disposal, or recycling of all or a portion of the product, or addition of a sustainability factor.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the status update relates to a post-retail sale state of the product in a product lifecycle.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the product ID is associated with the product, or associated with a service provided by the product.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the archival component further updates the data store with the status update in order to maintain a history of states or transactions associated with the product.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the analysis component recalculates impact values included in the history based upon a configurable set of parameters in order to generate a current sustainability score for each set of parameters provided.

7. The system of claim 6, wherein the archival component stores to the data store a respective current sustainability score for each entity that provides a respective set of parameters.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the analysis component generates or updates a third party sustainability rating based upon at least one of the sustainability score of the product, the impact value, an additional sustainability factor, or a history of states or transactions associated with the product.

9. The system of claim 1, further comprising a tracking component configured to employ one or more sensors or devices to monitor the state of manufactured product, and further configured to construct the status update based upon information received from the one or more sensors or devices.

10. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more sensors or devices comprise at least one of an emissions detector, a control or operation sensor, a radio frequency identification (RFID) module, a global positioning satellite (GPS) module, a bar code scanner module, or an optical state recognition module, or a software state recognition module.

11. The system of claim 1, further comprising a labeling component configured to construct a label update based upon a current sustainability score maintained by the data store.

12. The system of claim 11, wherein the label update comprises a set of instructions for adjusting a label or interface presented or displayed by the product.

13. The system of claim 11, wherein the labeling component constructs the label update based upon an input to an interface associated with the product.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein the input relates to an intended or desired future state of the product.

15. A product label, comprising:

means for receiving an impact value associated with a state of a product bearing the product label; and

means for reconfiguring the product label as a function of the impact value and one or more sustainability metrics.

16. The product label of claim 15, further comprising means for monitoring the state of the product according to at least one predetermined sustainability metric.

17. The product label of claim 15, further comprising means for determining the impact value.

18. A method for facilitating sustainability tracking in connection with use or consumption of a manufactured good, comprising:

employing one or more sensors for monitoring a state of a product with respect to a set of sustainability factors;

determining an impact to a sustainability score associated with at least one sustainability factor included in the set as a function of the state; and

updating the sustainability score based upon the impact.

19. The method of claim 18, further comprising at least one of the following:

employing an impact associated with a particular state of the product resulting from an act or behavior associated with a third party for constructing or updating a sustainability rating for the third party;

or

associating the sustainability rating with the third party.

20. The method of claim 18, further comprising at least one of the following:

reformulating at least one of the sustainability score or the impact based upon configuration parameters or sustainability factors provided by an authorized entity;

or

determining a forecasted impact for an indicated future state of the product based upon at least one of the sustainability score for the product, one or more sustainability factors, a state history associated with the product or a score history associated with the product.