Jaco Quist
Technology Assessment Group,
Delft University of Technology,
Jaffalaan 5,
NL-2628 BX Delft,
The Netherlands
Tel: ++31152785594,
Fax: ++31152783177,
E-mail: j.n.quist@tbm.tudelft.nl
  

Developing successful routes towards sustainability will necessarily involve stakeholders from a broad range of societal groups. Given the unsustainable consumption and processes of contemporary society, such routes will require radical departures from current systems. The proposed paper will describe that part of the SusHouse (Strategies towards the Sustainable Household) project which explored possible strategies for progressing towards sustainable households, defined as those households offering a Factor 20 improvement in environmental efficiency by the year 2050. The principal focus of the paper is the development of a methodology for creating scenarios explicitly designed to reconcile the 'shopping, cooking and eating' function of Dutch, Hungarian and UK households with the Factor 20 definition of sustainable performance. The 'Design Orienting Scenarios' (DOSs) originated from ideas generated during stakeholder creativity workshops conducted to elicit a range of possible environmental futures, which could subsequently inform the design, business and policymaking processes. The forthcoming DOSs tended towards system changes to services rather than products. Several DOSs, each founded on a distinct series of proposals, explored alternative means of achieving sustainable 'shopping, cooking and eating' lifestyles. The proposed paper will proceed to discuss the methodological development of the SusHouse project, and the applicability of such an interactive stakeholder methodology to other areas of research, particularly those seeking to generate sustainable futures.

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Last updated: 13 November, 2008