As consumers are concerned more about the environmental problems, they
become anxious about how products affect the environment. But multipl
e factors like greenhouse effect, ozone depletion and acidification ma
ke it difficult for a designer to estimate a product's environmental i
nfluence at an early design stage. To solve the problem, we have intro
duced a tool named DFE (Design For Environment), which enables designe
rs to estimate the costs and the environmental influence of products w
hen disposed. The social background, criterions for the estimation, an
d overview of the DFE as well as current and future development activi
ties at Sharp are described.