Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Ethical Issues in Engineering
Ethical Issues in Engineering
Ethical Issues in Engineering
installations, for a bridge and for a lightweight open truck trailer. A diference can be
Proefschrift
ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor
aan de Technische Universiteit Delft,
op gezag van de Rector Magnificus prof. dr. ir. J.T. Fokkema
voorzitter van het College voor Promoties,
in het openbaar te verdedigen op maandag 14 november 2005 om 10:30 uur
door Anke Christine van GORP
materiaalkundig ingenieur
geboren te Tilburg
Dit proefschrift is goedgekeurd door de promotoren:
Prof. dr. ir. P.A. Kroes
Prof. dr. M.J. van den Hoven
Samenstelling promotiecommissie
Rector Magnificus, voorzitter
Prof. dr. ir. P.A. Kroes, Technische Universiteit Delft, Promotor
Prof. dr. M.J. van den Hoven, Technische Universiteit Delft, Promotor
Prof. dr. A. Grunwald, Forzungszentrum Karlsruhe GmbH
Prof .dr. B.A.W. Musschenga, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
Prof. dr. ir. P. Kruit, Technische Universiteit Delft
Prof. ir. A. Beukers, Technische Universiteit Delft
Dr. H. Zandvoort, Technische Universiteit Delft
Dr. ir. I.R. van de Poel heeft als begeleider in belangrijke mate aan de totstandkoming
van het proefschrift bijgedragen.
ISBN-10: 90-9019907-1
ISBN-13: 9789090199078
ISSN: 1574-941X
Simon Stevin Series in the Philosophy of Technology
Delft University of Technology & Eindhoven University of Technology
Editors: Peter Kroes and Anthonie Meijers
Volume 2
e-mail: anke_van_gorp@yahoo.com
ISBN-10: 90-9019907-1
ISBN-13: 9789090199078
ISSN: 1574-941X
Contents
1 Introduction 9
4.3.5 Regulation 64
4.4 Light throw away after use? 65
4.5 Sustainable and / or safe 70
4.6 Summary of the case and the regulative framework 70
4.6.1 Ethical issues 71
4.6.2 Decision making on ethical issues 73
4.6.3 Regulative framework 74
4.7 Acknowledgements 76
Literature 191
Samenvatting 199
Appendix 1 211
Appendix 2 215
Dankwoord 219
One ethical question that arises in relation to the design of the Herald of Free
Enterprise, and other ro/ro ferries, is whether it should have been designed to be
more safe given the fact that it was known that water entering the deck might
result in rapid capsizing. This is a moral problem because passengers, crew and
——————————————————————————————————
1
This description of the Herald of free enterprise disaster is based on “Ethical considerations in
engineering design processes” [Van Gorp and Van de Poel, 2001]
9
Ethical issues in engineering design
their families are harmed when a ship capsizes. There were, and are, simple
technical solutions if one wants to prevent rapid capsizing when water enters a
deck. Bulkheads created on the decks can easily prevent water from flowing freely
over a deck and prevent rapid capsizing [www.safetyline.wa.gov, 2005].
Bulkheads on decks, however, give rise to longer loading / unloading times and
take up space on the decks, hence this costs money.
When we look at ethical problems in relation to the design of the Herald and
comparable ships, ethical issues become relevant at different stages of the design
process and during the use of the product. Ethical issues are relevant during the
formulation of criteria and requirements for the design and in the acceptance of
trade-offs between requirements. I will focus on the formulation of safety
requirements for a ro/ro passenger or freight ferry, and on the trade-offs that
exist between safety and economic requirements. This description will explain
why ro/ro ferries were not designed in a way that would prevent rapid capsizing if
water floods a deck.
10
Introduction
Most IMO conventions affect new ships but do not apply retrospectively to
ships already at sea. This is known as the grandfather clause. The grandfather
clause protects the poorer states, because for them it would be too costly to adapt
their older fleets to new legislation. IMO legislation may thus be said to be weak
and ro/ro vessels complying with IMO legislation are still prone to rapid capsize.
Apart from the IMO, insurance and classification companies also have a part
to play in the formulation of safety requirements. To obtain hull insurance from
insurance companies such as Lloyd’s of London, a ship needs to be classified.
Classification organisations are private organisations that monitor compliance
with legislation during construction and certify sea worthiness during a ship’s
lifetime. Only the ship’s equipment and construction are taken into account by
the classification organisations, they do not deal with passenger safety [Van
Poortvliet, 1999].
There is little incentive for shipping companies to ask for, or for shipyards to
design, ships that are safer than required by IMO conventions and hull insurance
regulations. When disasters occur the investigation that follows usually concludes
that it was a human error that led to the disaster. Little attention is given to the
design of the ship as long as, on completion, the ship complied with the current
regulations of the time.
Six actors are important in the formulation of the safety requirements laid down
for ro/ro ferries. These actors are: the IMO, governments, insurance companies,
classification companies, shipyards and shipping companies. To understand why
these six actors have not formulated tighter safety requirements, it is important to
realize that when safety requirements are formulated a trade-off is made with
economic requirements.
Economic considerations are important for insurance and classification
companies because they depend on shipyards and shipping companies. When
the safety requirements they impose are more costly than those of competitors
they will lose customers. Insurance companies will want the requirements to be
tight enough to prevent them from having to pay out too frequently for hull loss
and damages. However, they usually do not want to impose more or tighter
requirements than their competitors as they are afraid of loosing their customers.
Shipyards do not have loyal customers. To be competitive the price needs to
be kept as low as possible or at least lower than that of the competitors. Safety
measures are usually only built in when there is a legal obligation to do so.
Shipyards may not be held liable if, at the time they were built, their ships
complied with the relevant legislation.
Shipping companies in Northwest Europe are in strong competition with
trains and planes, therefore they do not want to face increasing costs or longer
11
Ethical issues in engineering design
loading times. In the case of ro/ro ferries, shipping companies do not want to
have bulkheads on the decks because it takes time to put them in place while
loading the ferry. Moreover, fewer cars can be transported because the bulkheads
have to be designed in such a way that larger and smaller cars can fit between
them; this requires spacing between the bulkheads that is less efficient if large
cars and freight-trucks are considered. So shipping companies also trade off
safety against economic considerations.
Finally, the IMO and governments of individual countries also trade off safety
considerations against economic ones. As we saw earlier for IMO conventions to
be effective as many countries as possible have to support them. For many
countries, economic considerations will play an important part when it comes to
deciding which safety requirements they consider acceptable. This is reinforced
by the fact that shipping companies can choose which flag they sail under.
Governments could forbid ships that do not meet their stricter national
regulations from entering their harbours. There are economic reasons not to do
this. A government’s national harbours, where stricter regulations are enforced,
will have a competitive disadvantage compared to harbours in countries that do
not impose stricter regulation than the IMO regulation. This, in turn, reinforces
competition between countries when it comes to devising attractive rules for
shipping companies. Such competition may well water down safety
requirements.
To summarise, some of the important ethical issues in the case of the Herald of
Free Enterprise are the following: the ship’s design was inherently unstable once
water entered the car deck. Is it ethically justifiable to design, produce and use
ships that are in certain circumstances inherently unstable? What is the
responsibility of engineers in this complex situation? There were no warning
lights on the bridge, therefore it was not possible to establish from the bridge
whether the bow doors were closed or not. Should engineers attempt to anticipate
human errors during the design process? Is it the responsibility of the engineers
to design in a way that prevents human errors as much as possible or even to
design idiot proof ships? It is, for example, desirable to design ferries that cannot
leave port unless the bow doors are fully closed and secured. As we have seen in
setting the design requirements, trade-offs are made between safety and
economics. There is economic pressure to water down safety requirements. Are
trade-offs between economics and safety acceptable? Which of the choices
regarding this trade-off can be justified? Does following the regulations lead to
morally acceptable designs? Ethical issues that come up in design processes like
the ones mentioned above will be central in this thesis.
12
Introduction
Technology has a profound influence on society. New possibilities and new risks
arise as a consequence of the employment of new technologies and products.
Decisions made during design processes shape the possibilities and risks of
products. These decisions are ethically relevant. Some decisions, for example, can
have a large influence on the safety of people using the product. Although there
is extensive literature on design processes and on engineering ethics, specific
attention for ethical issues in design processes is relatively new. A lot of the
literature on engineering ethics has been developed from the study of disasters
such as the Herald of Free Enterprise or cases of whistle-blowing but in these
studies only little attention is given to the design process. In this research I will
focus on daily practice in engineering design. It might seem strange to start this
chapter with the description of a disaster given that I will look at daily
engineering practice, the description of the Herald disaster is only intended to
make it clear that engineers make choices regarding ethical issues during design
processes. These decisions can, but need not, have detrimental consequences.
With or without the actual occurrence of the Herald disaster, the design of this
ro/ro ferry may be seen as an example of daily engineering practice. My research
question is as follows:
What kind of ethical issues come up and how do engineers deal with these ethical
issues during design processes?
This analysis of design practice will contribute to engineering ethics.2 It will
provide detailed information on which ethical issues play a part in engineering
design and how engineers decide about these issues. This information should
enrich discussions on the moral responsibility of engineers in design processes.
The objective of this research can be summarised as follows:
To provide a contribution to discussions on the moral responsibilities of
engineers in engineering design processes.
The contribution will consist of detailed descriptions of engineering design
practices and a normative analysis of these design practices. As can be seen in
the Herald case there can be regulation pertaining to the design of the product.
This research should provide information for answering, amongst others, the
following question: do engineers behave in a morally responsible manner if they
follow the existing regulations or should responsible engineers do more than
just follow the regulations?
——————————————————————————————————
2
People interested in design research and not engineering ethics might be interested in the
case descriptions because actual design processes are described.
13
Ethical issues in engineering design
——————————————————————————————————
3
Some philosophers indicate that morality describes a code of conduct of a society or another
group [Gert, 2002]. Ethics or moral philosophy is then construed to be a critical reflection on
morality. I will use the terms “ethical” and “moral” interchangeably.
14
Introduction
issues will not be considered ethical issues in this thesis. An example of this is
that some industrial designers conflate aesthetic and moral values.
Some of the ethical issues are also legal issues, for example safety issues.
There is a lot of legislation, standards and codes pertaining to safety and design.
This makes decisions regarding safety no less ethically relevant, it only provides
engineers with rules they should follow from a legal point of view when making
decisions. In these cases the way engineers deal with these issues can be
evaluated both from an ethical and a legal point of view. Decisions about the
safety of a product might then be morally right or wrong and legal or illegal. A
question that can be raised in such instances is whether a design that is safe
enough according to legislation is also ethically acceptable and vice versa.
Legislation, codes and standards regarding safety can also be evaluated ethically.
15
Ethical issues in engineering design
16
Introduction
lower top speeds would also save a lot of fuel as the fuel consumption is higher at
higher speeds. Lower fuel consumption also decreases CO2 production. Smaller
speed differences, for example between trucks and cars may possibly decrease the
number of accidents occurring on roads and thereby the number of people
injured and killed on roads. So by choosing to design a car with lower top speeds,
be it by actively limiting the top speed of the car or designing a less powerful
engine, engineers can reduce fuel consumption, CO2 production and the amount
and severity of accidents on highways.
17
Ethical issues in engineering design
18
Introduction
could not imagine human rights issues in their company. Second, others thought
that ethics was only concerned with what kind of life a person should live and
wondered what designing had to do with that. Third, some people, Bachelor
students especially, thought that I would study the etiquettes in their design
team. Fourth, some engineers shared the interpretation of ethical issues used in
this study and expected me to look at decisions concerning the safety of the
design or the prevention of disasters. I deliberately did not correct the engineers
who thought that I was interested in etiquette, the good life or human rights. My
presence might have influenced the design team but as most of the engineers did
not know exactly what I was looking at it is not likely that they placed more
emphasis on decisions concerning safety and sustainability. I taped whole design
meetings and made notes throughout design meetings and interviews, not only
when safety or sustainability issues were under discussion. If engineers asked
questions about my research results I usually referred to the presentation that I
would give later on.
As little is known about the way engineers deal with ethical issues in daily
engineering design, this was an exploratory research project. Based on ideas
taken from the literature on design processes, and to be presented in chapter 2,
working hypotheses were formulated. These working hypotheses and the
selected cases are introduced in chapter 3. The cases are described in chapters 4
to 7. Conclusions are drawn from the cases and an effort is made to generalise
the results of the case-studies in chapter 8. The results from this research are
used to make a start with defining conditions for warranted trust in designing
engineers, in chapter 9. These conditions lead to a preliminary delineation of the
moral responsibilities that engineers have during a design process.
19
2 Engineering ethics and design processes
The research question and objective formulated in chapter 1 indicate that this
thesis contributes to engineering ethics. This research should lead to
descriptions of the ethical issues engineers encounter and how they deal with
these issues in design processes. The focus on ethical issues in engineering
design processes is relatively new. As yet in engineering ethics there has not
been a lot of systematic attention for design processes, as will be indicated in
section 2.1. An overview of the literature on the nature of design processes is
presented in section 2.2. This overview is relevant because the ideas about the
nature of design processes are used to guide the gathering of data in the case-
studies. Ideas about design processes that are particularly relevant for this thesis,
because these ideas explain and inform the formulations of working hypotheses
presented in the next chapter are introduced in section 2.3.
Research into ethics and design is part of the research field of engineering ethics.
In this section I will not give a complete overview of engineering ethics literature.
I will restrict myself to a description of the main issues that are focussed on in
engineering ethics and how this research is positioned with regards to these
issues.
Engineering ethics is the field of study that focuses on the ethical aspects of
the actions and decisions of engineers, both individually and collectively. A rather
broad range of (ethical) issues are discussed in engineering ethics: professional
codes of conduct, whistle-blowing, dealing with safety and risks, liability issues,
conflicts of interests, multinational corporations, privacy etc (see for example
[Harris et al., 1995] [Davis, 1998] and [Bird, 1998]). A substantial amount of
literature on the teaching of engineering ethics to engineering students has been
developed since the beginning of the 1980’s, (cf.[Baum, 1980] [Unger, 1982]
[Martin and Schinzinger, 1989] [Harris et al., 1995], [Birsch and Fielder, 1994]).
A salient feature of engineering ethics literature is that a lot of it has been
developed based on studies of disasters like the Challenger disaster ([Vaughan,
1996] and [Davis, 1998]). Another feature of engineering ethics is that, especially
in the United States, there are a lot of proponents who regard engineering ethics
as a kind of professional ethics (cf [Schaub et al., 1983] [Davis, 2001] and [Harris,
2004). The idea is that the engineer as a professional has obligations not only to
his or her employer but also to the general public, as for example doctors or
21
Ethical issues in engineering design
22
Engineering ethics and design processes
persons who clearly cooperate in the design process just because they have
another job description or another educational background.
In many design processes, ethical problems are indeed difficult to recognise and
less specific than some of the examples given in the literature on disasters. I
agree with Lloyd and Busby that in every design process “smaller” ethically
relevant decisions are made. I think however that it is problematic to regard all
decisions as being possibly ethically relevant. Some values like, for example,
efficiency are not moral values (see section 1.1.1). Efficiency is therefore not
——————————————————————————————————
2
Of course also the extent to and the way in which products are used is important.
23
Ethical issues in engineering design
Van de Poel’s approach would imply that, for example, the formulation of
requirements is an action that can be expected to be done during design
processes. Formulating requirements can be ethically relevant, for example, if
safety requirements are formulated. These requirements need to be
operationalised and this operationalisation is also ethically relevant. Different
alternatives that score differently with respect to different requirements and
different operationalisations of requirements may have to be assessed. Trade-offs
between different requirements may have to be made. In accordance with Van de
Poel’s approach these actions can all be ethically relevant if related to moral
values, and therefore these are included in this research.
The concept of value sensitive design has been developed within computer ethics
and human computer interface design. According to Friedman and others:
24
Engineering ethics and design processes
This definition does not imply that value sensitive design is only applicable
within software and computer design. Yet, the concept has until now been mainly
used within these fields and not with regard to the design of other kinds of
technology [www.nyu.edu/projects/valuesindesign/index.html]. In using a
philosophical analysis of values and sociological research into the use and
development of technology, value sensitive design is an attempt to make software
designs that account for moral values like privacy and autonomy.
The research under taken here may be considered research into the way
engineers deal with moral values during engineering design processes and
therefore research into value sensitive design. There is, however, a difference:
whereas researchers into values sensitive design are trying to develop a method
for dealing with moral values, I will concentrate on describing how engineers
deal with ethical issues like safety and sustainability. Another difference is that
some ethical issues that are very important in software design like, for example,
privacy and identity are not that important for my case-studies of engineering
design.
2.2 Design
The features of design problems and design processes relevant to the topic of
this thesis are presented in this section. At the end of this section I will present
the conception of design processes used in this work.
——————————————————————————————————
3
One could also speak of the design of an organization in which an organizational structure is
designed rather than a material structure. I will focus on the design of material artefacts.
25
Ethical issues in engineering design
1999]). Cross presents a model of the design process that consists of three
phases: generation, evaluation and communication. A concept is generated in the
first phase of the design process. A designer needs to understand the design
problem and to find possible solutions for it; this usually happens
simultaneously. Possible solutions help the designer to get a better
understanding of the design problem. The concept is evaluated in the second
phase. During the evaluation, a decision is made as to whether the possible
solution meets the requirements. The concept is adapted in an iterative process.
Often, more than one iterative step is necessary because adaptation of a part of
the design can lead to problems in other parts of the design. The design is
communicated to the people who are responsible for production in the third
phase. Drawings, computer drawings and descriptions of the design are used in
this communication [Cross, 1989].
Another more detailed model is proposed by French [cited in Cross, 1989, 21
–22]. French divides the design process into four activities:
• analysis of the problem
• conceptual design
• embodiment of schemes
• detailing.
An analysis of the design problem should lead to a clear statement of the
problem. The requirements and constraints are formulated in this phase. The
designer searches for different possible solutions and makes schemes of them in
the conceptual design phase. In the next phase, embodiment of schemes, a
choice is made between the schemes. The scheme is further detailed in the
detailing phase.
Although there are different models that can be used to divide the design
process into different phases and use different terms to name the phases, there
are similarities between the models, (see also [Roozenburg and Cross, 1991] and
VDI 2221: Systematic Approach to the Design of Technical Systems and Products cited
in [Cross, 2000, 39]). The design process can grosso modo be described as follows.
The goal, requirements and constraints are defined at the beginning of the design
process. This is sometimes done by the customers or in co-operation between
customer and engineers. After this a creative part follows in which concepts are
generated and evaluated. In the next phase, one concept is chosen and that
concept is further detailed. Finally, drawings and descriptions of the design are
made for the production of the product. The design process is not a linear
process; it is iterative. It may always be necessary to go back one or more steps
and then move forward again.
26
Engineering ethics and design processes
Design problems are, however, usually not problems where a clear set of
requirements is available that completely determines the solution. Design
problems are more or less ill-structured problems ([Simon, 1973] and [Cross,
1989]). Simon states that in the ill-structured problem of designing a house:
‘There is initially no definite criterion to test a proposed solution, much
less a mechanizeable process to apply the criterion. The problem space is
not defined in any meaningful way,’ [Simon, 1973, 311]
27
Ethical issues in engineering design
For Simon the main characteristics of an ill-structured problem are that the
solution space is not well-defined and that there is no criterion to test different
solutions and decide which is best. Cross gives the following characteristics of ill-
structured problems:
‘1. There is no definite formulation of the problem.
2. Any problem formulation may embody inconsistencies.
3. Formulations of the problem are solution-dependent.
4. Proposing solutions is a means to understanding the problem.
5. There is no definitive solution to the problem.’ [Cross, 1989, 11-12]
Some design methods require that engineers formulate the requirements and
solutions separately and independently, but this is impossible if design problems
are ill-structured. In a redesign of an existing design it might be possible to
formulate most of the requirements at the start of the design process but this is
not a definition of the requirements independent of the solution. The solution
space is, in these cases, limited because a redesign is made; certain features of
the product will remain the same. Other design problems aiming at designing a
completely new product are very ill-structured and only some vague
requirements can be formulated at the start of the design process. So design
problems can be more or less ill-structured.
An example of an ill-structured problem is the following. In the mid nineteen
nineties substitutes were sought for replacing CFCs as coolants in refrigerators,
because CFCs damage the ozone layer [Van de Poel, 1998 and 2001]. Two
alternatives were considered: HFC 134a and hydrocarbons, both have their
advantages and their disadvantages. Hydrocarbons are for example flammable
and existing refrigerator design needed to be changed if hydrocarbons were
used. HFC134a has a long atmospheric lifetime and if released would therefore
still damage the environment, although to a lesser extent than CFCs. There were
different operationalisations available for the environmental, health and safety
criteria. Both proposed solutions scored differently under different
operationalisations of the criteria. There was no solution that was best under all
operationalisations. No definite criterion was available to say which solution was
the better one. This example shows that even for the seemingly simple case of
looking for a substitute coolant in existing refrigerator design, there are features
of the problem that make it ill-structured.
In cases where a design problem is an ill-structured problem, there may be
more than one solution; each of these solutions can be valid. Engineers, in this
case, have to make a choice: it is not the case that the requirements will lead to
just one solution. At the start of a design process, there may not even be a clear
and unambiguous set of requirements. During the design process it may be
proved that there is no solution to the ill-structured problem. In some cases it
28
Engineering ethics and design processes
29
Ethical issues in engineering design
The stories can be used within the entire company or within single departments.
The whole company or design team might know the story of a previous design
failure. Stories of specific difficult customers might only be known in the sales
department. Knowing the stories is part of being part of the design team or
department. Stories can therefore be inclusive or exclusive in their use [Lloyd,
2000].
Baird and others conducted an ethnographic study at Rolls-Royce Aerospace
[Baird et al., 2000]. They conclude that personal interaction between engineers is
crucial for information to be disseminated throughout an organisation. Engineers
who know each other from other projects tend to ask each other for advice when
working on new projects. At the beginning of the design process more
experienced senior engineers are very important. They help younger engineers
and point them ‘to the sequences and sources of expert opinion they should seek’
[Baird et al., 2000, 350]. According to Baird et al., this helps with structuring the
design problem.
30
Engineering ethics and design processes
With regard to active responsibility, the problem of many hands can be seen
when no one feels or thinks that he or she is responsible for certain issues. If
issues are not specifically part of someone’s task description, everyone can avoid
taking responsibility for them. These issues may then be neglected in the design
process.
In a paper on the relationship between how companies are organised and harm
they cause other people, Darley studied a case of the design and testing of landing
gear for a military aircraft that failed during landing after test flights [Darley,
1996]. People in the company knew that there were calculation errors and
because of these errors there was a large chance the landing gear would fail.
Certain social mechanisms made the people in the organisation actively conceal
the calculation errors for their customers and tinker with data in certifying
documents. In this case people felt either forced by their superiors or felt they
were already too involved and caught up with the tinkering of the data to stop the
concealing of calculation errors.
Darley also points to the way a decision is framed. Stopping a production
process or changing a design requires action, while going on is often seen as not
requiring action. Action has to be defended to other people while in the case of
doing or changing nothing, such defence is not required. Action is only taken
when there is proof of harm. This frames the decision in an “innocent until
proven guilty” way. This is different from using a precautionary frame for the
decision, where no harm has to be proven. A suspicion of harm can be enough to
warrant acting against it. Framing a similar decision differently can lead to
different actions [Darley, 1996]. This might be relevant for design processes,
especially when decisions have to be made to stop or go on with a design process.
The aspects of design processes mentioned above are all relevant from an ethical
point of view and therefore they were included in the conception of design
processes used in this thesis. In view of the foregoing, I regard design processes
as organised social processes which aim at solving more or less ill-structured design
problems in this work. All of these aspects mentioned above were used to support
data-collection in the case-studies. For example, in the case-studies attention was
paid to the organisation of the design team and the social processes within the
design team because this helped me to determine who was involved in what
decisions when dealing with ethical issues.
31
Ethical issues in engineering design
So far, some very general characteristics of design processes have been discussed.
When studying ethical issues in engineering design it may be useful to make
further distinctions between different kinds of design processes. It might be
expected for instance that during the design process for a bolt for a car wheel,
different ethical decisions have to be made than those that have to be made
during the design process for a completely new personal transportation device.
Ideas drawn from the literature are used to characterise the different kinds of
design processes. Working hypotheses are formulated in the next chapter based
on these ideas. I conclude this chapter with a discussion of some preliminary
ideas regarding what this research, and its results, might contribute to
discussions about the moral responsibility of engineers during design processes.
These ideas will be further elaborated in the last chapter of this thesis.
——————————————————————————————————
4
The ideas in section 2.3.1 and section 2.3.2 are based on the paper ‘The need for ethical
reflection in engineering design; the relevance of type of design and design hierarchy’ [Van de
Poel and Van Gorp, 2006].
5
I am not arguing that more constraints always lead to better structured problems, because too
many constraints can also lead to over determined problems.
32
Engineering ethics and design processes
As the example of the bolt and the new transportation device suggests,
engineers are confronted with different degrees of external constraint in different
design processes. According to Vincenti [Vincenti, 1992], this degree of external
constraint depends mainly on two dimensions: the level of design hierarchy and
the type of design (normal versus radical).6
Design hierarchy
Most modern products consist of several parts, subassemblies and subsystems.7
In many cases these subsystems and parts are more or less independently
designed. Depending on how the design process is organised, different teams
and engineers work on different parts of the product. There is communication
and co-operation between the teams or at least there usually is. These design
teams can be from the same or from different companies. The parts,
subassemblies and subsystems are ordered hierarchically. The complete product
is designed at the highest levels of the design hierarchy; subsystems and parts are
designed at lower levels. Vincenti divides the design hierarchy of the design
process of an airplane in the following levels.
‘1. Project definition: translation of some usually ill-defined military or
commercial requirement into a concrete technical problem for level 2.
2. Overall design: layout of arrangement and proportions of the airplane to
meet the project definition.
3. Major-component design: division of project into wing design, fuselage
design, landing-gear design, electrical-system design etc.
4. Subdivision of areas of component design from level 3 according to
engineering discipline required (e.g., aerodynamic wing design, structural
wing design, mechanical wing design).
5. Further division of categories in level 4 into highly specific problems e.g.
aerodynamic wing design into problems of platform, airfoil section and
high-lift devices).’ [Vincenti, 1990, 9].
There are similarities between Vincenti’s ideas of design hierarchy and the
design hierarchy levels defined by Disco et al. [Disco et al., 1992]. Disco et al.
distinguish the following levels of hierarchy:
• systems, like a plant, electricity or cable networks
• functional artefacts, like cars, etc
• devices like pumps, motors etc
• components, like materials, nuts, condensers etc
——————————————————————————————————
6
Vincenti uses the term “technical constraints” instead of external constraint, but this is a
misleading term in my view since some of the constraints mentioned by Vincenti are not
technical but rather social in nature. Vincenti seems to use the term technical constraints for all
constraints that the engineer s of a design team cannot change [Vincenti, 1992].
7
Walton, for example, estimates that there are about 30.000 parts in the Ford Taurus [Walton,
1997].
33
Ethical issues in engineering design
Vincenti’s divisions of the design hierarchy are more fine grained at the lower
levels. Component design is not the lowest level but middle level. Disco et al. add
the systems level at the highest level.
According to Vincenti, the degree of external constraint is larger if the design
process is lower in the design hierarchy. The higher levels of the design process
pose external constraints for the lower levels. Examples of these constraints are,
amongst others, dimensional constraints, a part needs to fit in the whole product,
but also constraints concerning the function of the part.
The ideas of Vincenti and Disco et al. about design hierarchy seem to
resemble the phases in the design process presented in section 2.2.1, but there is
a difference. The difference between design hierarchy and the phase of the design
process is that a design process is done for every product, subassembly or part.
This means that at every level of the hierarchy all phases of the design process are
gone through. One could think for example of the generation of concepts design
phase of a part of a product. This would be the generation of concepts design
phase of a middle level design. The relative importance of design phases can
differ in the design hierarchy, for example in high level design the phase of the
design process in which detailed drawings are made can be relatively
unimportant compared with the generation of concepts.
Type of design
Besides the notion of design hierarchy Vincenti also introduced the notion of
design type ranging from normal to radical design. Vincenti uses the terms
“operational principle” and “normal configuration” to indicate what normal
design as opposed to radical design is [Vincenti, 1990]. “Operational principle” is
a term introduced by Polanyi [Polanyi, 1962]. It refers to how a device works. The
normal configuration is described by Vincenti as:
‘….. the general shape and arrangement that are commonly agreed to
best embody the operational principle.’ [Vincenti, 1990, 209]
Examples of different working principles of car engines are a combustion engine
and a fuel cell electrical engine. Both engines power cars but they have different
working principles. In a combustion engine fuel and air are let into a cylinder
and ignited. The expanding volume of the ignited gases is used to get a rotational
movement. In fuel cell cars an electrochemical reaction between hydrogen and
oxygen produces electricity. This electricity is used to drive the car. So although
both engines power the car they do so in a different way. In normal design, both
operational principle and normal configuration are kept the same as in previous
designs. In radical design, the operational principle and/or normal configuration
are unknown or it is decided that the conventional operational principle and
normal configuration will not be used in the design.
34
Engineering ethics and design processes
Regulative framework
Vincenti claims that there are more external constraints in normal as opposed to
radical design [Vincenti, 1992]. Normal design is a form of standard design
practice guided by existing formal and informal rules. A system of regulations
and formal rules concerning a product exists in normal design. I will refer to this
system as a regulative framework. A regulative framework for a certain product
consists of all relevant regulation, national and international legislation, technical
codes and standards and rules for controlling and certifying products. A
regulative framework is socially sanctioned, for example by a national or the
European parliament or by organisations that approve technical codes. Besides
the technical codes and legislation, interpretation of legislation and technical
codes are part of the regulative framework. Interpretations of codes and
legislation can be provided by the controlling and certifying organizations and
also by engineering societies for example in the courses they organise for
engineers on state of the art design practices. Engineering societies can also
formulate a code of ethics. This code is also part of the regulative framework.
Note that the regulative framework does not include company specific norms
and standards. If company specific norms and standards were to be included
then the regulative framework would differ in different companies. Companies
are restricted in formulating company specific norms and standards, because
these norms and standards have to meet the rules and regulations of the
35
Ethical issues in engineering design
regulative framework. Company specific norms and standards can therefore only
impose stricter requirements than the regulative framework.
The notion of a regulative framework differs from notions like technological
regime or technological paradigm in that the regulative framework includes only
formal norms, rules and their interpretations that pertain to the design,
certification and construction of a product. Technological regimes are defined by
Rip and Kemp as:
‘the rule-set or grammar embedded in a complex of engineering
practices, production process technologies, product characteristics, skills
and procedures, ways of handling relevant artefacts and persons, ways of
defining problems- all of them imbedded in institutions and
infrastructures.’ [Rip and Kemp, 1998, 338]
A technological regime defined in this way includes much more than the
regulative framework as it also includes skills and ways of handling artefacts and
persons. Other authors have used other definitions of technological regimes. Van
de Poel for example focuses on defining technological regimes for design
processes. Although Van de Poel restricts his definition of technological regimes
to technical regimes for design processes, he includes more in a technical regime
for the design of a product than is included in a regulative framework, such as
promises and expectations of a product [Van de Poel, 1998 and 2000a].
——————————————————————————————————
8
Grunwald does not explicitly state that engineers have an obligation to use the normative
framework but the requirement “observed” seems to imply this. In an article from 2005,
Grunwald has changed the requirement of observed to ‘compliance: the normative framework
also has to be complied with in the field concerned.’ [Grunwald, 2005, 189].
36
Engineering ethics and design processes
With regard to the acceptance of the normative framework Grunwald states that
acceptance needs not be universal, but neither should it be restricted to the very
narrow sphere of engineering. Instead it ‘must include further groups or
individuals such as the assumed users, but also people possibly affected by the
side-effects or other impacts’ [Grunwald, 2001, 419-420]. Grunwald considers the
normative framework to be a “morale provisoire”: it is relative to ‘the actual state
of the relation between culture, society and technology, relative to the moral
convictions of society and to the knowledge about consequences and impact of
technology.’ [Grunwald, 2000, 191]. The normative framework is therefore
dynamic.
According to Grunwald, a normative framework consists of all obligations
given by political regulation and all obligations resulting from other societal
regulation like technical codes and standards, and codes of ethics [Grunwald,
2000]. The normative framework that Grunwald has formulated comprises
therefore the same elements as the regulative framework. In my analyses of the
different design processes the question whether regulative frameworks exist and
fulfil the above requirements plays an important role.
2.3.3 Moral responsibility and the trust relationship between engineers and
society
Engineers have specific knowledge and experience and play an important part in
the design of products. Engineers are given power to decide in design processes.
This power is limited by the regulative framework. In this thesis, I will assume
that a trust relation exists between society and engineers designing products.
Engineers are given “a licence to operate” based on this trust relationship. Being
trusted by society brings with it responsibilities for the engineers. Engineers
have responsibilities towards their customers and to society as a whole. The
37
Ethical issues in engineering design
It is this trust relation and its ethical relevance that I will further analyse here.
Much more can be said about trust than I can do in this section and the last
chapter. I will use a specific notion of trust based on ideas from Annette Baier
and Bart Nooteboom as a basis for claims about the moral responsibility of
engineers.9
In her paper ‘Trust and Antitrust’, Annette Baier uses the examples of
plumbers and surgeons to illustrate that we trust them to do what is necessary to
fix what is wrong. We trust them and we do not prescribe what they should do
exactly to fix, for example a leak [Baier, 1986, p. 250]. Baier claims that it is not
possible to prescribe precisely what plumbers and surgeons must do because we
do not have that knowledge. If we would be able to prescribe precisely step by
step what the plumber has to do and what he should not do then we could
probably repair the leak ourselves. My claim is that in a similar vein we trust
engineers to design safe products without prescribing precisely what they should
do and refrain from doing.
Baier claims that trust is a special sort of reliance: in trust we rely on the
goodwill of someone else. Trust can be seen as ‘a three- place predicate (A trusts
B with valued thing C)’ [Baier, 1986, 236]. Discretionary power is given to the
trusted person. This means that the trusted person is allowed some discretion
but not allowed to do everything he or she thinks is a way to take care of the
valued thing. There are limits as to what the entrusted person should be or is
allowed to do. Baier uses the example of a babysitter:
‘a babysitter who decides that the nursery would be improved if painted
purple and sets to work to transform it, will have acted, as a babysitter in
an untrustworthy way, however good his good will.’ [Baier, 1996, 236]
In most everyday situations the limits of this discretionary power are not
negotiated or expressed explicitly. People are expected to know the limits of the
discretionary power they get if they are trusted. If I ask my neighbour to take
care of my plants and mail while I am away on holiday, we both know that I do
——————————————————————————————————
9
Annette Baier has written an influential paper on trust within ethics. Bart Nooteboom has writ-
ten a book on trust that includes insights from economics, rational decision making, behav-
ioural sciences and ethics and focuses on trust in and between organizations.
38
Engineering ethics and design processes
not expect or want her to read my mail, pay my bills or reply to my mail. I trust
her to water my plants and place my mail on the table without reading or
answering it. Therefore, trust gives power and responsibility but within limits.
According to Baier trust can be morally decent or not. Having trust in
someone who is cleverly concealing his or her untrustworthiness might be
morally wrong according to Baier, especially if that untrustworthy person is
using his or her discretionary power to gain more power over the person who
trusts him or her. In cases of sects, leaders are often trusted and abuse this trust
to gain power over their followers and harm them. This is of course quite a far
fetched example but it shows that not all trust leads to the protection of what
people value, and that trust can be morally wrong. Trust in engineers might be
misplaced and even morally wrong if engineers are trying to harm people with
their work.
An interest has also been shown in trust between people and trust in
institutions within economics and management theory [Nooteboom, 2002].
According to Nooteboom trust is a four-place predicate:
‘Someone (1) trusts someone (or something) (2) in some respect (3),
depending on conditions such as context of action (4).’ [Nooteboom, 2002,
38].
For example, if I am ill then I trust my doctor to take care of me and cure me. If
however, I have a terminal disease then the doctor has not behaved in an
untrustworthy manner because he has not cured me. A doctor may behave in an
untrustworthy manner in other respects but the fact that he cannot cure my
terminal disease does not make him untrustworthy. Nooteboom’s notion of trust
differs from the one Baier proposes in that the context of action is made explicit
in his notion. You trust someone to do things to the degree to which he or she
can influence the situation and has the power to change certain situations for the
good. Another difference is that Nooteboom includes the possibility of trusting
an organisation.
‘Of course an organization itself does not have an intention, but it has
interests and can try to regulate the intentions of its workers to serve those
interests.’ [Nooteboom, 2002, 75].
39
Ethical issues in engineering design
40
Engineering ethics and design processes
that the company is ISO 9001 certified. Process-based trust derives from the
developing relationship between people.10 A regulative framework can produce
institutions-based trust. The public will tend to trust engineers to make good
designs because the engineers adhere to the rules and standards of the regulative
frameworks and act in a trustworthy manner.
The trustworthiness of engineers should not just refer to not acting on bad
intentions towards the person(s) trusting you. Trustworthiness also includes
being competent (cf [Jones, 1996, 7]). Engineers designing products have to have
the competence to make good designs if they are to be trusted as engineers.
Trustworthy engineers know what their competence is and when to ask someone
else for help or advice to produce a safe design. Trust in engineers that mean
well but do not have a clue as to what they are doing is misplaced.
The public expects engineers to design products that will, in normal
circumstances and use, not lead to disasters. If disasters do happen then trust
may have to be reconsidered. Perhaps the design engineers behaved in an
untrustworthy manner or maybe some unanticipated and unforeseeable
circumstances materialized. A regulative framework has to incorporate these
circumstances if the public is to trust engineers making designs using the same
regulative framework again. It can be said that the boundaries within which trust
in engineers is the default are drawn anew in cases in which regulative
frameworks are changed following undesirable effects.
Trust in engineers might be misplaced if the regulative framework is not
adequate. I assume that an adequate regulative framework provides a basis for
warranted trust. Grunwald’s requirements may be construed as requirements
for an adequate regulative framework. If trustworthy and experienced engineers
are given regulations that they should follow and do indeed follow, these
regulations should lead to the protection of what people value. This might be
achieved by requiring that the framework is accepted. The requirements that a
regulative framework should be complete, unambiguous and consistent can be
regarded as requirements that make sure that the rules of a regulative
framework can be used in design processes. Based on the above I formulate the
hypothesis that trust in engineers making designs is warranted if engineers (1)
have good intentions (2) are competent and work according to a regulative
framework and (3) the regulative framework is adequate, e.g. it complies with
Grunwald’s requirements. I will analyse this hypothesis in more detail in
chapter 9.
——————————————————————————————————
10
An example of process-based trust is that if loyalty has been shown then trust will be
strengthened.
41
Ethical issues in engineering design
2.4 Summary
The idea that design processes are processes in which an organised group of
people tries to solve more or less ill-structured technical design problems
underpinned the data-collection in the case-studies. Information about the
organization of the design team, the design problem, social processes within the
design team and the phase of the design process that was studied, was obtained
during the case-studies
It can be expected that different kinds of ethical questions will come up
during different kinds of design processes. Vincenti’s ideas about design type
and design hierarchy are used to characterize design processes. According to
Vincenti, the design type has two extremes, radical design and normal design.
The design hierarchy refers to whether a complete product or part of a product is
designed. What Vincenti calls normal design may be the same as what
Grunwald calls business-as-usual technology development. The availability of a
pragmatically complete, locally consistent, unambiguous, accepted and observed
normative framework in business-as-usual technology development would,
according to Grunwald, mean that there is no need for ethical reflection by
engineers. Engineers should just follow the normative framework.
Finally, engineers are trusted by the public to design products and
technologies. If a normative framework exists then this may pose the limits
within which trust in engineers making normal designs is the default and not
misplaced. Regulative frameworks can help to maintain and develop institutions-
based trust. Trust in engineers designing products would then be warranted if
engineers (1) have good intentions (2) are competent and work according to the
regulative framework and (3) the regulative framework is adequate, e.g. it
complies with Grunwald’s requirements.
42
3 Introduction to the case-studies
Vincenti’s design hierarchy and design type were introduced as dimensions that
can be used to characterise design processes in section 2.3. According to Vincenti
there are more external constraints in normal, as opposed to radical design, and
in low, as opposed to high level, design. As said in section 2.3.1, the solution
space is limited in normal design processes because normal configuration and
operational principle are used. Moreover, the requirements pertaining to the
normal configuration and working principle have probably already been
operationalised. In radical design the solution space is less limited, and there are
fewer given requirements that are operationalised to test possible solutions. This
may mean that engineers have to face other kinds of ethical issues in radical, as
opposed to normal, design and in low, as opposed to high level, design. Based on
this idea the working hypotheses 1a and 1b were formulated as follows:
1a) The kinds of ethical issues faced by engineers depend on design type
and design hierarchy.
1b) The ways in which engineers deal with these ethical issues depend on
design type and design hierarchy.
43
Ethical issues in engineering design
——————————————————————————————————
1
For more information on large (sociotechnical) systems see for example [Hughes, 1987],
[Hughes, 1983], [Ottens et al., 2004] and [Kroes et al., 2004].
44
Introduction to the case-studies
several months but, due to time considerations it was not possible to observe a
complete design process from problem definition to production and use.
The following four cases were selected:
One, a design of a lightweight sustainable car at Delft University of
Technology for the DutchEVO project. The conceptual design to produce a car of
400 kg mass that can carry four persons and their luggage is radical high-level
design. Normal car design leads to an average mass for the car of 1200 kg. The
mass requirement in the DutchEVO project made reconsidering the normal
configuration and the working principle of a car necessary.
Two, a design for piping and equipment for the petro(chemical) industry. In
this case-study the design process for pipes and pressure vessels was studied. The
working principle and normal configuration of pressure vessels and pipelines
were used in this case. This was normal design and because it consisted of
component design, it was low level design.
Three, a design for a bridge over the Amsterdam-Rijnkanaal. In this case-
study the preliminary design phase for a bridge over a canal was studied at the
engineering company owned by the city of Amsterdam. The bridge was designed
to have the normal configuration and working principle of arched bridges. It was
high level design because the design process concerned the whole bridge.
Four, a lightweight open trailer design for loads such as sand. In this case-
study the preliminary design and feasibility study design phase for a light trailer
was studied within an engineering company. The trailer had to be able to be used
in combination with a truck, thus it was part of a combination and therefore a
middle or low level design. The trailer should have no roof, be made in
composites and able to include a new unloading system. The normal
configuration for an open trailer was not used because of the new unloading
system and the use of composites; giving a radical design.
The selected case-studies are listed with regard to their design type and
hierarchy in table 3.1.
Table 3.1: the selected case-studies
radical normal
Low-level design A light open trailer for bulk Piping and equipment
loads design for (petro)
chemical industry
45
Ethical issues in engineering design
All the case-studies were performed in the Netherlands. There seem to be large
differences in the importance of hierarchy and the way people interact and
communicate with each other between countries. Although the different business
cultures of different countries have been studied and have been given scores on
scales for several dimensions, making well-informed hypotheses about the
influence of different cultures on the way engineers deal with ethical issues is
very difficult (cf. for differences in (company) cultures [Luegenbiehl, 2004],
[Hampden-Turner & Trompenaars,1993], [Hofstede, 1991] and [Van der Vaart,
2003]). Large differences in company cultures were observed even between
North-European countries (see [Trompenaars & Hampden-Turner 1999] and
[Hofstede, 1991]). Besides the difficulty of making hypotheses on the influence of
different cultures on the way engineers deal with ethical issues, it is necessary to
limit the number of variable parameters as the number of necessary case-studies
increases with the number of variable parameters at play in the case-studies [Yin,
1989]. I therefore chose to perform all my case-studies in the Netherlands.
The DutchEVO design team was followed for over a year (from June 2000 to July
2001). Extensive observations were made during meetings (see appendix 1). This
case-study was used as a pilot study to develop ideas for the research presented
here.
The case-study piping and equipment consisted of interviews with engineers
working at an engineering company, an interview with an engineer who had
worked in the petrochemical industry, an interview with an inspector from
Lloyd’s register Stoomwezen, an interview with an advising engineer, coupled
with reading of background information regarding codes and legislation etc. The
interviews were held between February and May 2002 (see appendix 1). It was
not possible to observe a design team at work because the customers of the
engineering company would not allow someone form outside to observe a design
process for a (petro)chemical installation.
The bridge case-study lasted from January 2004 to April 2004, the design
meetings were observed and the engineers and the architect involved were
interviewed (see appendix 1).
The trailer design process was also observed; the observation period lasted
roughly from March 2003 to August 2003. The engineering company designed
the trailer for a customer, and design meetings and meetings with the customer
were observed. The engineers in the design team and the customer were also
interviewed.
46
Introduction to the case-studies
Empirical data on the following features of the cases were obtained using the
working hypotheses and taking into account the features of design processes
discussed in section 2.2.
• design problem
• design type
• design hierarchy
• the regulative framework: legislation, regulation, technical codes and
standards, interpretations of these codes and regulation given by
professional organisations or certifying organisations
• phase of the design process
• organization of design team (formal and informal)
• social processes within design team
All the chapters on the case-studies (chapters 4-7) are structured similarly.2 First
a description of the design problem, the type of design and the design hierarchy
is given. This section is followed by a section about the organisation of the design
process and the context. The context of the design process includes a description
of the relevant codes, standards and regulations that may constitute the regulative
framework. The way the engineers dealt with safety and sustainability during the
design process is described in some detail. The empirical findings are
summarised and discussed in the last section in which any regulative frameworks
used during the design process are discussed in terms of a confrontation with
Grunwald’s requirements.
——————————————————————————————————
2
If wished the reader need only read the final section of the case-study chapters, followed by
chapters 8 and 9.
47
4 DutchEVO, safe or sustainable?
49
Ethical issues in engineering design
Most measures that will make the car safer will make it also less sustainable. The
results from the case are summarised in section 4.6.
50
DutchEVO, safe or sustainable?
I started following the DutchEVO project in May 2000, one year after the start
up. I therefore had to rely on existing documents and interviews to obtain
information about the start of the project.
Design requirements
In what follows, the design requirements, as formulated in the design document
‘DutchEVO the development of an ultralight sustainable conceptcar’, are quoted
[Knoppert and Porcelijn, 1999]. This design document was written after the
design work had started. The initial aims of the project were:
-‘To design a sustainable compact family car for use in and around
Western European cities after the year 2009,
-to show that it is possible to create a sustainable and affordable car for
mass production,
- to design a means of transportation unrestricted by existing design,
image, structure and production philosophies,
- to create an integrated design and giving priority to weight, safety,
cost, volume and comfort in this order. {Knoppert en Porcelijn, 1999]’
A list of design requirements for the DutchEVO is given in table 4.1 below.
——————————————————————————————————
1
Later on in the design process it was decided that this engine should be combined with a light
hybrid system that recovers braking energy.
51
Ethical issues in engineering design
Based on the design requirements given in table 4.1 the design process can be
classified as high level and radical. The reasons for this classification are
discussed below. At this moment European family cars usually weigh about
1200 kg, even the two seats Smart has an empty mass of 720 kg. The design
requirement to produce a sustainable car with an empty mass of less than 400
kg is what makes the design radical. This is radical in a functional way.
Structurally, it was not certain whether the normal configuration could be used
or not, whether some parts of the normal configuration could be used was
something that had to be decided on during the design process.
A concept or prototype of a complete product is, automatically, a high level
design process. At the lower levels, especially on component level, some parts
can be (adapted) existing parts; other parts will need to be specially designed. For
example, during the design process the decision was taken to use an existing
engine (car or motorbike engine) because developing a new engine would be too
time and money consuming. This engine could, according to the DutchEVO
design team, then be combined with a light hybrid system to recover braking
energy. A sketch of the DutchEVO, made during the design process, is shown in
figure 4.1.
52
DutchEVO, safe or sustainable?
Figure 4.1: Sketch of DutchEVO [picture courtesy of the DutchEVO design team]
The design team in this case-study was a large and volatile group. Students
participated for a year or less, coming and going throughout the project and
causing the group to change continuously. In total 17 people had actively
participated during the time I observed the design team. Most of the people
involved in the design when I observed the group are listed in appendix 2, which
include an overview of their educational background and for how long and when
they participated in the DutchEVO project.
A lot of different university groups participated in the design process.
Officially there were three subgroups within the project dealing with:
53
Ethical issues in engineering design
54
DutchEVO, safe or sustainable?
Figure 4.2: DutchEVO design team as observed. Thomas, Pete and Dave are at
the centre because they coordinated and used information from people in the
other groups. There was also some direct contact between members of different
groups but most of the time this contact was organised via Thomas, Pete or Dave.
Most PhD students were advisors. Katinka, Alexander, Susan and Ann did not
really participate in the design.2 They regarded DuchtEVO as a case-study for
their scientific research. They gave input in project meetings, for example on
recyclability. Katinka and Alexander should really have participated in the design
process according to the official organisation but in reality they acted as advisors
and not as team members.
When interviewed, the responsibilities that team members indicated they felt
responsible for, coincided with their task description. Those in advising roles felt
responsible for giving good advice. Students felt they had clear descriptions of
their tasks, they were confident that they knew what they had to do and what
they could expect other team members to do. Students were usually given the
task to design a part of the car, for example the suspension or the
understructure. These task descriptions were made by the supervisors in co-
——————————————————————————————————
2
Dave was a PhD student when the project started. He became a lecturer during the project. Ed
was a PhD student that participated in the design project.
55
Ethical issues in engineering design
operation with the students at the start of their master’s or bachelor’s thesis
project. The task descriptions consisted of information about the goals the
student was expected to achieve, a time schedule and the names of the
supervisors. The partitioning of the design process into a lot of small projects
assigned to different persons seemed to diffuse the responsibility that people felt
for the project and its completion. Students only felt responsible for the part they
were designing.
Dave, Ed, Pete and Thomas in contrast to advisors and students, had vague
task descriptions, as a result it was not obvious to the other team members what
their task was: they seemed to feel responsible for the whole project.
Thomas, Pete and Charlie stated in interviews that they felt responsible for
communication between all the team members. It was very important that the
different team members communicated with each other. Decisions made
concerning one part of the car influenced how other parts of the car should be
designed and because of the rapid changes in the composition of the team, it
was difficult to keep track of who was involved in designing what part. In the
time that Charlie was doing his master’s thesis project the team communicated
more often. Team members knew what the others were doing; there were
discussions on a lot of subjects. This was not completely due to Charlie but he
played a large part in facilitating this communication. Around the time that
Charlie finished his master’s thesis some staff members decided that all the
meetings were costing too much time and the team meetings ceased to be
organised regularly. Without regular meetings only Thomas and Dave had an
overview of what was going on in the project.
56
DutchEVO, safe or sustainable?
they were doing seemed to depend on commitment. It took effort to obtain the
information relevant for a specific design task and this had to be done
continuously as the design team and the design itself changed continuously.
Some team members quit without finishing a report on what they had done.
This made it nearly impossible for other team members to use their results.
If members were not committed to the team, and did not share the same
goal, there was a risk that they did not know what the rest was doing and only
showed up at some project meetings, thus failing to gain insight into who was
doing what, when, and which decisions had been made or would be made within
a few weeks. To participate in the decision making, members of the team needed
to invest time in communicating with other team members. Katinka and
Alexander were officially team members but they only attended some project
meetings and did not often communicate with project members apart from
during these project meetings. As a result of this limited communication
Katinka and Alexander did not really participate in the overall design project.
They were not aware of how decisions were made and when they were made.
Katinka and Alexander’s main goals were writing scientific papers about
biodegradable plastics and designing for recyclability, the DutchEVO was just a
case-study for them.
Decision making was not ordered hierarchically. There were relations
between different team members that could be regarded as hierarchical because
some team members acted as supervisors for other team members. Although
there was a hierarchical relation between the students and their supervisors this
was not really observable. It seemed that every one had an equal voice in the
decision-making process.
The project leader, Thomas, was responsible for guiding the decision making
process of the team members and he felt responsible for checking that team
members included all relevant aspects in their decisions. The role of the project
leader in the decision making process was clearly observable. He asked
questions about the process and the arguments, especially with regards to the
DutchEVO ideas on sustainability. He sometimes closed a discussion by saying
‘if you have thought about it and think this is possible then we will do it this
way’. Although Thomas did not decide in technological choices, he had a central
position as the project leader. He had an overview of the project and knew what
team members were working on. Thomas knew that certain decisions had been
made while other team members did not always know what their colleagues
were doing. Thomas also knew the financial status of the project, he knew
whether certain ideas were possible, given the budget they had been allotted.
This gave the project leader a special position as he had access to critical
information.
57
Ethical issues in engineering design
Above I have described the decision making process; I will now focus on the
argumentation used during the DutchEVO design process. During the design
process the initial requirements, decided on at the beginning of the process,
seemed to gain authority over time. It seemed requirements like lightweight and
fun-tot-drive were taken to be self-evident. According to the team, fun-to-drive
meant that a ride in the car should feel bumpy and exciting without leading to
bodily discomfort.
Pete: ‘I want a good contact with the car but without bruised buts or
headaches. A Spartan ride but no broken kidneys.’
If an option was considered to be fun-to-drive or just fun then that was an
argument to use that option in the design. It was not enough that an option was
fun, as can be seen in the following quote about the sunroof but it was regarded
as a strong argument for an option.
Dave: ‘You can do much nicer things with composites; with glass fibre
you can do fun things.’
New team members accepted criteria like fun-to-drive and lightweight without a
lot of questions or critique. If new team members criticised these ideas they
were easily convinced by old team members to accept these ideas. As an example
of the authority that requirements gained over time, take the following. By the
time that I started following the project, about a year after the official start, it was
no longer possible to question the criteria lightweight and emotional
sustainability as measures of sustainability (for an explanation of emotional
sustainability see section 4.4). Even though there are contradictions between
sustainability as it is usually understood and what is meant by emotional
sustainability. Some project meetings were attended by people from outside the
project team. The question whether an electrical or hydrogen car would be more
sustainable was raised on some occasions. The answer was usually that
58
DutchEVO, safe or sustainable?
hydrogen cars were not feasible and electrical cars were too heavy and used too
many resources and too much energy considering the introduction date. A
lightweight car was feasible and more sustainable according to the design team.
Most people, some team members as well as people from outside, found the
term “emotional sustainability” vague and did not know what it meant and this
kept them from starting a discussion.3
The personal experiences of engineers played a large part in arguments used
and decisions made during the design process. The ideas on car safety were
based on the experiences of the engineers (see section 4.3). George and Jill
designed the suspension concept, they both had experience with old Mini
Coopers and they thought that the suspension of these cars made them fun-to-
drive, simple, light and elegant. George and Jill performed a multi-criteria
analysis because they feared that they might be prejudiced in choosing to base
the suspension on that used in the Mini Cooper. The result being that the
suspension based on that of the Mini Cooper was still the suspension of choice
for a fun drive and a lightweight car. Another example of personal experience
providing arguments for design choices is the following. Thomas was the only
one of the design team who had children. The DutchEVO was designed for 2
adults with 2 kids in the backseats. Thomas regularly emphasised the fact that
there should be allowance made for children on the backseat. For example in a
discussion on the use of fabric for the doors:
Thomas: ‘Will there be a draught, there might be small children on the
backseat.’
Thomas also indicated a few times that the car should not feel too vulnerable
because he as a parent, would not want to put his children in a car that did not
feel safe. A fabric door that would move in response to wind would be
unacceptable to him as a parent. None of the other team members ever
mentioned that kids would be seated on the backseats.
——————————————————————————————————
3
In interviews some students said that they did not understand what was meant by emotional
sustainability,( see section 4.4).
59
Ethical issues in engineering design
This is accomplished by designing safety cages and using airbags. The “safest”
cars at this moment as tested by EuroNCAP, a cooperative of different European
consumer and governmental organisations, incorporate the following safety
devices: twin front airbags (dualchamber), thoracic side airbags, head protection
airbags (curtain), load limiters for all belts, double pre-tensioner for driver belt,
buckle pre-tensioner for front passenger belt, retractor pre-tensioners for rear
outer belts, three-point centre belt, and ABS.4 As I observed during the
DutchEVO project, safety can refer to five different aspects of the design and
situations.
Figure 4.3: Picture from EuroNCAP of a frontal impact test [picture taken from
the crash test pictures for downloading at the media centre of the EuroNCAP
website]
60
DutchEVO, safe or sustainable?
pumps etc. Therefore, it would be difficult to include ABS and still have a
prototype of less than 400 kg. Another way, to prevent accidents, and the way
preferred by the design team, is to change the behaviour of drivers. The
responsibility for safe driving stays with the driver. The team wanted the driver
to feel a bit vulnerable. In their discussions they talked about not including
safety devices and about making the driver responsible.5
They did not have a lot of argumentation or proof to underpin their opinion
that not including safety systems makes a driver drive more carefully. Dave was
developing the safety ideas for the DutchEVO. He had done some literature
research but the idea of making a driver drive more safely because she feels
vulnerable seemed to be based mainly on personal experience and gut feeling. A
master’s student did the main part of the literature survey, but came up with
literature that only indirectly supported the statement that if a driver feels
vulnerable he or she will drive more safely. The master’s student who did the
literature survey was not part of the design team. She was not introduced to the
team and there was no contact between her and the design team. Her literature
survey was supposed to be done independently without knowledge of the ideas
held within the DutchEVO design team. The literature survey could then be used
as a check on the ideas prevalent within the DutchEVO project. Dave was,
however, the master’s student’s supervisor and it is questionable whether the
literature survey was done completely without knowledge of the teams ideas on
safety for the DutchEVO.
During the time that I observed the design team the ideas about car safety
were not discussed within the team. The ideas about safety no longer seemed to
be open to discussion. Students and other people joining the team accepted,
without any notable criticism, the idea that making a driver feel vulnerable
would be beneficial for traffic safety. All discussions about safety that were
observed concerned practical issues like the inclusion or not of airbags.
——————————————————————————————————
5
In this they seem to forget that there are other drivers. If a driver is driving responsibly, he /
she can still be hit by another less prudent or drunk driver.
61
Ethical issues in engineering design
the design team felt the engineer was responsible for designing a car that
protected passengers and driver in the event of a crash.
These different reasons can lead to differences of opinions when it comes to
deciding whether to include passive safety systems in a car design. If the reason
to include passive safety systems is an economic one, a cost-benefit analysis can
be used to determine whether a system must be included. This requires,
however that monetary value is placed on the lost lives of car crash victims and
assigned for the types of injuries likely to be caused in a car crash. These
monetary values are always arbitrary to some extent, the costs of hospitalisation
can be estimated but the price for suffering is much more difficult to estimate. If
you think that an engineer is responsible for designing a car that protects the
people inside the car, the use of cost-benefit analysis can be problematic. There
was one discussion during a project meeting in which an assistant professor
specialising in reliability did not agree with the use of cost-benefit analyses
regarding safety issues. It was not right to put money on a person’s life in his
opinion. He thought it was not possible to decide about including passive safety
systems based on a comparison of the costs of these safety systems and the costs
of the human lives that would be saved.
Associate professor: ‘But how many millions is it worth to save one
person? You can’t express the life of one human being in terms of the
costs of a change.’
Thomas : ‘In principle I agree but that’s how it works.’
Dave: ‘In aerospace we calculate it that way.’
With this the discussion ended and was never started again. The arguments put
forward by Thomas and Dave seem to imply a naturalistic fallacy: it is usually
done this way therefore it should be done this way. In other presentations where
‘the costs of unsustainabilities , i.e. deaths, injuries, lost labour hours, oil spills,
of car accidents’ were presented no one objected to putting a monetary value on
a human life and comparing this with the costs of removing oil from the road.6
The fact that the project team was designing a very light car decreases
passive safety as the lighter car will always have the highest acceleration in a
crash with a heavier car. This is a law of nature and cannot be prevented. It is
however possible to change the design of cars in such a way that crashes cause
less damage to the drivers and passengers in cars. One way to prevent injuries is
to use airbags. Another way is called crash compatibility. A heavy car crashing
into a smaller lighter car already has the advantage of the lower acceleration.
——————————————————————————————————
6
Note that in this presentation deaths are regarded as part of the “unsustainabilities” of traffic.
This use of the term unsustainabilities including deaths and injured people was observed
sometimes in presentations.
62
DutchEVO, safe or sustainable?
Often the heavy car is also very stiff and will deform less than the small lighter
car. The heavy car uses the deformation zone of the lighter smaller car. This
damages the lighter car even more and increases the chances of injury and death
in the lighter car. If the heavier car is an MPV (Multiple Purpose vehicle) or SUV
(Sports Utility Vehicle) then most of the times it also has a large ground
clearance. The stiff load bearing structure is higher above the ground than the
load bearing structure of the smaller car. Therefore the heavy car will crash
above the load bearing structure of the smaller car, for example it will crash into
the door instead of into the floor in a side impact. This further diminishes the
chance of the occupants of surviving the crash in the smaller, lighter car. A way
to make such a light car safer in crashes is to change the design in such a way
that heavy cars will crash into the load-bearing structure. This is called crash
compatibility. In view of the foregoing it was decided that the floor of the
DutchEVO will be higher, so that, in event of a crash, incoming cars will crash
into the load-bearing floor.
Including more and more passive safety systems (belts, airbags) would
according to the design team, also enhance the feeling of safety and would
therefore lead to an overestimation of the driver’s and car’s capabilities.
Therefore the team wanted to evaluate critically all existing passive safety
systems and did not want to include all of them. In the design team there was a
difference of opinion about what to include and what not, especially regarding
airbags. Inclusion of airbags adds mass. One of the discussions on airbags can
be found in the introduction of this chapter. In this quote it can be seen that for
some team members the lightweight criterion was more important. So in a
trade-off between safety and lightweight, the mass of a system was decisive for
them. Dave, in contrast, did not want to make a decision about the inclusion of
passive safety system based on the mass of the system. He wanted to make that
decision based on the efficacy of the system for preventing deaths and injuries.
63
Ethical issues in engineering design
4.3.5 Regulation
During observation of design meetings, it became clear that the way this design
team dealt with safety regulations was ambivalent. The quotes given below are
loose fragments of discussions on regulations and the DutchEVO.
Charlie: ‘In general you should follow that regulation. You need very
strong arguments to not comply with the regulations.’
Dave: ‘If the regulations say this, I sometimes think the hell with those
regulations.’
64
DutchEVO, safe or sustainable?
Some regulations were used to guide the design process and were seen by the
team members as something that smart people had worked on for a long time,
so they should strive to comply with the regulations. For example the regulations
on lighting and view angles should be met according to the design team. The
design team also thought that for a concept car to be realistic most regulations
should be taken into account.
Dave: ‘regulations give guidelines for the design process…… They give
guidelines and we want a realistic car so you take them [regulations] as
a guideline, you could take something else but you want to be realistic
and this is easy and well documented.’
However, some regulations were regarded as silly or not effective and the team
felt that regulations should be challenged. This was the case with crash safety
regulations. The team thought that the obligatory crash tests were inefficient.
Most actual crashes do not resemble the prescribed crash tests. A lot of fatalities
are due to speeding on roads and crashing at a speed of about 80 km/h or more
into a tree or lamp post or other solid object. The standard crash test at 64 km/h
into a wall is very different from a crash into a tree. According to the design team
challenging crash safety regulations can only be done using very good
argumentation.
The definition used by the design team for sustainability is that of the World
Commission on Environment and Development, the Brundtland-commission
[WCED, 1987]. This commission defined sustainable development as a
development that meets the needs of the present generation without
compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. Two
things are important in this definition.
1. The concept of ‘needs’, refers in particular to the essential needs of the
world’s poor, to which overriding priority should be given.
2. The idea of limitations imposed by the state of technology and social
organisation on the environment’s ability to meet present and future
needs.
65
Ethical issues in engineering design
community with moral rights. In using the Brundtland definition a choice was
made for an anthropocentric view on the conservation of nature and resources.
In an anthropocentric vision on nature, only humans have intrinsic value and
moral rights. Nature only has instrumental value for humans. It can help
humans to survive and flourish. In anthropocentric visions, the conservation of
nature is aimed at securing that future human generations can live in
comparable or better conditions than humans do today.
Before I started following the project, discussions had taken place regarding
whether personal transportation can be sustainable. The fact remains that
considering the Brundtland definition it is difficult to justify designing a city car.
In cities there are usually enough other forms of transportation available, such
as bicycles or public transportation that use fewer resources than driving a car.
The DutchEVO team decided that people should be enticed to behave more
sustainable without denying them personal mobility. So a more sustainable car
would lead to a more sustainable world and this can be done using today’s
technology. The design team thought that trying to convince people to use other
modes of transportation was not effective because the number of kilometres
driven in cars is still growing in the Netherlands.
Dave wrote most of the documents on sustainability used within the design
team. He indicated that he only knew of the Brundtland definition of
sustainability and was not aware that there are also non-anthropocentric views
on sustainability. The definition was compatible with the ideas of the team
members. In the interviews it became clear that all the team members embraced
an anthropocentric view on the conservation of nature and included the needs of
future generations.
Thomas: ‘Well you assume the continuity of humanity.’
Dave: ‘.. base is just the definition from the Brundtland report, to take
care that we can offer future generations the same chances that we
have now.’
66
DutchEVO, safe or sustainable?
——————————————————————————————————
8
That is, 95% of the total mass of the car. A very heavy steel car will easily comply with this
legislation. When the interior, electrical wiring, battery and dangerous chemicals are removed,
the steel structure and bodywork can be melted and reused. To comply with this legislation
when designing a very light car is much harder because the hard to recycle interior, electrical
wiring, battery etc will make up much more than 5% of the mass of the car. The relative mass of
the easy-to-recycle body panels and cage construction is much lower than in the heavy car [De
Kanter and Van Gorp, 2002].
67
Ethical issues in engineering design
were both advisors for the project and were working on PhD-projects concerning
recycling of cars. However, a choice for an easy to recycle option was only made
in cases where this option was not significantly heavier than a lighter more
difficult to recycle option. A part where recycling was deemed important by the
design team was the understructure. The understructure was made of
aluminium and aluminium foam. It is usually understood in engineering that
aluminium is easy to recycle if two guidelines are used. The first guideline is that
wrought and cast aluminium should not be used together. If wrought aluminium
(more pure, less alloying elements and contamination) is recycled together with
cast aluminium (less pure, more alloying elements and contamination) then you
will get cast aluminium. The second guideline is that welded aluminium is easier
to recycle than bonded aluminium, the adhesive will contaminate the secondary
aluminium if it is not removed before smelting. The design team acknowledged
these guidelines and tried to use them in the design.
Pete and Dave introduced the term “emotional sustainability” in the sense that
more satisfaction than only that of arriving at B having set out from A should be
gained from driving with the car. The car should give more pleasure and
satisfaction while driving and while standing still than other cars. Emotional
sustainability included, according to the design team, the car being fun-to-drive
and the driver having “an ageing, caring and exploring relationship” with the car.
Pete: ‘…that we create a sustainable use without the user realising this
because they are forced to handle the car sustainably. Light-heartedly,
being able to have fun driving.’
Drivers should get more value and satisfaction from using the car than only
getting from one place to another. According to the design team the extra value
should not only be experienced in the driving. More value can be gained from
multiple use for the car, e.g. using the car when standing still i.e. as playground
for children (see figure 4.4).
Figure 4.4: Make use of the car when standing still [picture courtesy of the
DutchEVO design team].
68
DutchEVO, safe or sustainable?
Emotional sustainability should lead to a strong bond between car and driver. It
should be possible to personalise the car and the car should age beautifully. One
phrase that was often repeated is that it should be a pleasure to age with the car.
People should like the car so much that they will not discard it before it brakes
down. According to some design team members this would mean that less new
cars are sold and that would be more sustainable because less scarce raw
materials would be used to produce the cars.
With his remark Dave pointed to the fact that as engines age they become more
polluting and also engine technology will improve. Driving a car that is old can
therefore at one point become more polluting and energy consuming than
recycling that old car and producing a new one.
69
Ethical issues in engineering design
Safety and sustainability are values that are difficult to combine in a car.
Depending on the operationalisation of both safety and sustainability it can even
be impossible to design a car that is both optimally safe and sustainable. In the
DutchEVO project the lightweight criterion was regarded as the most important
part of the operationalisation of sustainability. This had a negative influence on
the safety of the people inside the car. A light car will always experience the
larger acceleration in a crash with a heavier car. In a car with a mass of 400 kg it
is also very difficult to include all kinds of active safety systems. Active safety
systems like ABS and Electronic Stability Program (ESP) require a lot of
electrical devices and hydraulical pumps, and above the mass added by including
these active safety systems these safety systems consume energy in use.
In discussions within the design team on including safety systems, the
argument that the systems would increase the mass was deemed very important.
The trade-offs that needed to be made between safety and sustainability (mass)
triggered a change in the operationalisation of safety. Some of the design team
members thought that mass should be a decisive argument. In most instances of
trade-offs between safety and sustainability, sustainability or at least mass got the
highest priority. During the design process it became apparent that it was not
possible to include all kinds of safety systems and still design a car of 400 kg.
First the criterion for safety was complying with relevant legislation and
performing well in crash tests (see for example the requirements in section 4.1).
Later in the design process safety became something like: as safe as the car can
be weighing no more than 400 kg combined with making the driver feel a bit
vulnerable. Instead of including all kinds of systems and devices the team
wanted to make the driver feel a bit vulnerable and responsible, thereby
promoting safe driving. A goal of the project became to challenge the existing
way of designing safe cars in which more systems and heavier cars are deemed
safer. Because it was not possible to use the operationalisation of car safety that
car industry uses nowadays and still design a car of 400 kg, the DutchEVO
design team was forced to think about the operationalisation of car safety. If the
DutchEVO design team had not set the requirement of a maximum mass of 400
kg they probably would not have had to think about and discuss about car safety.
They could just have included all systems that the price of the car would allow.
Although cars have existed for over a century, it can be concluded that
DutchEVO was a radical design process. It was radical in the functional way (see
70
DutchEVO, safe or sustainable?
section 2.3.1). The priority order of the requirements usually posed for cars were
especially different in this case. Mass was the most important requirement. This
made reconsidering the working principle and normal configuration necessary.
Some parts of existing cars were used, like for instance the engine. Other parts
were newly designed and very different from those used in normally designed
cars, for example the doors and the understructure. The ethically relevant
questions that could be discerned in the design process were related to it being a
radical design process. The operationalisation of safety and sustainability was
ethically relevant and was very important in this radical design process. The
engineers were confronted with ethically relevant questions concerning the
operationalisations because they did not want to use the regulative framework. If
the team had chosen to make a normal design these questions would not have
been posed. The regulative framework gives an operationalisation of safety and
sustainability that is used in normal design processes.
71
Ethical issues in engineering design
72
DutchEVO, safe or sustainable?
transportation are available, like buses, trams, walking and bicycling. Some of
these ways of transportation are definitely more energy efficient than driving a
lightweight car. Moreover, if the “good relationship” between user and car leads
to prolonged possession and use of the car, it is less clear to see what the effect
on energy consumption is, on the one hand the prolonged use might lead to less
use of raw materials, the production of raw materials usually consumes energy.10
The recycling of materials consumes substantially less energy. On the other
hand engine technology advances and older engines are more polluting than
engines using new technology. Above this, engines become more polluting as
they age. It might be possible to only renew the engine after a period of time.
However, this shows that it is not obvious that emotional sustainability leads to
lower energy consumption.
Finally, two ethical problems concerning the trade-off between safety and
sustainability were encountered by the design team. The engineers wanted to
challenge existing ideas on car safety, which have led to increasingly heavier cars
with lots of passive and active safety systems. The engineers wanted a
lightweight car. This meant first of all that passive safety systems were only
going to be used if the engineers thought that they were effective and not too
heavy. There were discussions about including airbags and minimising the
amount of safety systems used because these systems make a car heavy. The
trade-off between safety and sustainability led to the second ethical problem that
a light car will always come off worst in a crash with a heavier car so people in
the light car will always be at a disadvantage. Trade-offs between safety and
sustainability were made in which the mass of the car was usually given priority.
——————————————————————————————————
10
This is only the case when large parts of the car are discarded after use, not when every part
or the complete car are sold or recycled rather then discarded.
73
Ethical issues in engineering design
74
DutchEVO, safe or sustainable?
operationalisation and rejected this large part of the regulative framework. Most
of the ethical issues can be related to the rejection of the regulative framework.
The regulative framework gives minimal requirements concerning safety and
sustainability that exclude certain choices that the DutchEVO team had to
consider. It is for example not a question whether or not to include airbags in a
normal design; the existing regulative framework requires that all new cars have
at least an airbag for the driver. Trade-offs that have to be made in a normal
design process for a car are usually trade-offs between costs and safety. In an
expensive car more active safety systems can be included. The existing regulative
framework includes ideas about what a good and safe car is. The trade-offs are
guided by these ideas. No car manufacturer wants to make a car that performs
really badly in EuroNCAP tests. Performing less than other cars in EuroNCAP
tests is bad for business so it is economically seen good to make cars that
perform well in these tests. The DutchEVO design team rejected these ideas, and
especially the EuroNCAP crash tests, because they lead to heavy cars and only
address passive safety. An interesting question is whether the regulative
framework meets the requirements that Gunwald has defined for a normative
framework (see section 2.3.2).11
Pragmatically complete: It is questionable whether the regulative framework is
pragmatically complete although it is extensive. There are rules and guidelines
for dimensions, head lights, hoods, bumpers etc. Most parts of a car are
subjected to regulation. Questions can be raised as to whether the regulative
framework is pragmatically complete when it comes to issues about protecting
all traffic participants. There is an emphasis on protecting people inside a car.
This emphasis on people inside a car might lead to a more dangerous car for
people outside the car. An example of this is that pedestrian impact tests are not
required by legislation as yet. Another situation in which protective measures for
people inside the car are dangerous for people outside the car is when an
accident has happened and people need to be rescued from a car wreck. Airbags
that have not gone off during impact can do so during the rescue process thereby
injuring fire-fighters or other people involved in rescuing victims from car
crashes. A pragmatically complete framework would have to include rules and
measure to protect others than the drivers and passengers of cars.
Accepted: The main problem concerning the framework is acceptability. The
framework is accepted by most actors in the car industry and by people buying
new cars. It is questionable whether traffic participants, other than drivers of
cars, accept the framework. This framework imposes large risks on other traffic
participants. It is even questionable whether people driving older cars accept the
——————————————————————————————————
11
Interestingly, Grunwald uses an example of designing parts for automobile industry as an
example of business-as-usual technology development [Grunwald, 2000, 188].
75
Ethical issues in engineering design
framework, because people in old cars, often lighter and less stiff than newer
cars, have a disadvantage in crashes with newer cars that perform well in the
crash tests. Within the government there are some doubts about current
developments in car safety. The government has asked SWOV (Stichting
Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek Verkeersveiligheid, an institute for research into
traffic safety) to conduct research to see whether SUVs are indeed dangerous for
other cars and traffic participants. So although the framework is still accepted by
car industry and probably most people buying new cars, other actors like
environmentalists and pedestrians object to the regulative framework. It might
even be the case that the framework leads to a kind of coordination problem. If
someone is buying a car he or she might want the safest car for him- or herself
and his or her family because most other car buyers also do this. Driving a light
car gives people a disadvantage in traffic accidents. So even if people agree that it
would be better if everyone drove in a lighter car then they still might not want to
be the first in a lighter car. So even though people do not accept the regulative
framework, they might feel forced to buy a heavy and stiff car that seems to
indicate that they, as consumers, accept the regulative framework.
Observed: The regulative framework is observed, partly because it is legally
enforced. Cars have to meet certain regulations before they are allowed to be on
the road in Europe. The EuroNCAP test results are available to potential buyers
of cars. Although barely meeting the requirements is legally seen as enough, this
is usually not enough from a marketing point of view. It is very important from a
marketing point of view to perform really well in the EuroNCAP crash tests, so
there are other than legal reasons to observe the regulative framework.
I cannot judge whether the regulative framework for cars is locally consistent
and unambiguous but because it is not accepted by all affected actors it is not a
normative framework anyway. The DutchEVO engineers thus did not reject a
normative framework.
4.7 Acknowledgements
I would like to thank the DutchEVO design team and DIOC 16 for their co-
operation. I would specially like to thank Elmer and Jens for their co-operation
and support.
76
5 Piping and Equipment
Stress engineer: ‘It can be that you do not completely agree with the codes or that
something is not completely clear in the code, for example loads caused by winds. In
such cases you design according to your own insights and experience. The Stoomwezen
has to approve it. Norms and codes are developed over time and engineers and the
Stoomwezen have learnt from previous failures, near misses and problems. You do not
lightly deviate from norms and codes. Having said this there are some issues that are
not really covered by norms and codes, if you notice such a case you discuss it with the
Stoomwezen and ask them how the codes should be interpreted. These instances are,
however, exceptions.’
Ethical issues concerning safety and sustainability are not that difficult to
imagine in the area of chemical installations. I will not make an extensive list of
possible and actual accidents in (petro) chemical installations as I think that it is
quite obvious that safety is an important issue in piping and equipment design.
There have been large scale accidents such as in Bhopal and Seveso. Less
disastrous accidents also happen such as small leeks of toxic substances from
chemical installations, small scale explosions and other accidents involving
injuries to one or two people or the death of workers. Not all these accidents are
caused by design flaws, there are many different causes. Some may be due to
flaws in the starting process for an installation or to flaws in operation, however,
some accidents are at least partially caused by design problems.
The design process for piping and pressure equipment for (petro) chemical
installations is introduced in this chapter. The design process is described in the
first section. All legislation, regulation and codes pertaining to the design of
pipes and pressure vessels are introduced in the second section. This system of
rules and requirements will be considered a regulative framework (see section
2.3.1). The division of responsibilities and tasks is described in the third section
and this is based on interviews with engineers (see section 3.3). The ethical
issues are described in section 5.4. The case-study is summarised, and the
regulative framework is evaluated using Grunwald’s requirements, in section
5.5.
77
Ethical issues in engineering design
where the (petro)chemical installation will be built has also usually been selected
by the (petro) chemical company before the design of the piping and equipment
is started [De Haan et al., 1998]. Engineering firms are often contracted to design
the piping and equipment for a (petro)chemical plant. According to the
interviewees, (petro)chemical companies used to have their own engineering
departments but most of them have outsourced these departments and now hire
an engineering company to design piping and equipment for new plants. The
actual construction of the installation is done by a construction company.
There are different kinds of contracts between customers and engineering
companies. In reimbursable contracts the engineering company is paid per man
hour. The customer pays for the costs of materials and the costs of construction.
The customer is then free to choose to use cheaper or more expensive material as
long as it complies with regulations. Another type of contract is a turn-key
contract, with this type of contract the engineering company is responsible for
design and construction. If the customer wants a more expensive material or take
more safety measures then it is necessary to check if these measures were
incorporated in the original contract. At the company where I interviewed
engineers the specification of the design used in contract negotiations, was called
the scope of a project. Specialists from an engineering company must first work
with a customer to define precisely the scope of a project and thus determine all
the customer’s requirements. These turn-key contracts can lead to discussions
about whether certain features or materials are specified in the scope and who
has to pay for extra costs relating to using specific material and safety systems.
In the (petro)chemical industry the design problem is predominantly
delineated in the earlier stages by the (petro)chemical company. From the
moment an engineering company is contracted to produce a plant design there is
communication and co-operation between the engineering company and the
(petro)chemical company. At the engineering company the piping and
equipment design process starts with the making of a flow chart. This chart is
used to specify the amount and rates of the different liquid and/or gas flows, and
will be based on information provided by the customer. After the chemical flows
have been established, pipe diameters, vessel sizes and other dimensions are
calculated. When the necessary types of apparatus and pipelines are known, the
positions of the various vessels in the plant and pipelines, lay-out, are decided.
Things like access for inspection and cleaning are taken into account during this
process. The stresses in the material are calculated, and decisions are made as to
what specific pipe materials etc to use. There is feedback between those making
the calculations of stresses and those determining the positions of pipes and
vessels in the plant. These processes are followed by filling out the details of the
design and the bearing understructure. The “Manager of Engineering” of the
78
Piping and equipment
engineering company estimated that about 75% of the design process time at this
company was consumed by the process of detailing the design.
Designing piping and equipment can be considered middle to low level, normal
design (see section 2.3.1). Higher levels of the design process deal with the
specification of the product and the chemical reactions in the chemical
installation under construction. The overall design of the installation, including
flows of chemical substances and the pressure in different parts of the
installations, is a given constraint for the design process of the parts of the
installation. It is a normal design process because the equipment that will be
used and possible pipes are well known and have been used before. The
operational principle, layout and functional requirements are known at the start
of the design process. Standards and codes exist that prescribe the design or at
least provide the design process with guidelines. A problem that can arise is that
all these standards, codes, regulations, the customer’s requirements, practical
restrictions of the plant site, economic restrictions etc clash. For example, stairs
are required in installations that have a hydrogen sulphide flow. It is dangerous
to inhale the toxic hydrogen sulphide and therefore the total installation needs to
be accessible for people with tanks of compressed air on their back during an
accident. However, it is sometimes not possible to use stairs throughout the
whole installation due to a lack of space. In such a case a choice might be made to
have both stairs and a ladder, a ladder on one side of the installation and stairs on
the other side. The installation is accessible in emergency situations but space
has been saved. So, in piping and equipment design, the design problem is
sometimes over determined by external constraints.1 Such over determination
might force engineers to change requirements or not to fulfil all of a customer’s
requirements. Criteria to evaluate options are available in this case so the
problem is reasonably well-structured. However, possible over determination
prevents a piping and equipment design problem being really well-structured in
all cases. Requirements may have to be adapted to arrive at a solution to the
design problem.
Different regulations play an important part in the design and use of (petro)
chemical installations. The regulations, codes and standards that play a part
during the design process of piping and equipment in the (petro)chemical
——————————————————————————————————
1
I use over determination here in the sense that there are requirements that cannot possibly be
complied with simultaneously. Certain options comply with certain requirements and it is not
possible to find an option that complies with all requirements.
79
Ethical issues in engineering design
installation are listed in table 5.1. Note, I have included company standards and
specs in this table, however, these do not form part of the regulative framework.
5.2.1 Regulations
Pressure vessels have to meet sever specifications, under Dutch legislation,
regarding hazard prevention to protect the health and safety of persons, domestic
animals and property, before they can be used in the Netherlands. This law is a
performance based law: a certain goal should be attained although the means to
this goal are not specified. In the law there is little reference to specific hardware
that should be used. However, if codes are approved by the minister, then
products designed using those codes are assumed to comply with the Dutch law.
The codes do make reference to specific hardware.
At the time this research took place, a transition was taking place, moving
from national regulation to European regulation. The Pressure Equipment
Directive (PED) came into force 29 May 2002 [European directive 97/23/EC].
The PED substituted national legislation in European Union countries regarding
the production and use of pressure equipment. If pressure equipment is
designed to comply to European harmonised codes and standards it is assumed
to comply to the PED requirements. However, because most of the codes and the
standards had not been harmonised at the time of the transition, the use of
national codes and standards was permitted during design processes.
Additionally the engineering companies had to show that designs made
according to the national codes also complied to the safety levels required by the
PED. Certification bodies, called Notified Bodies, were appointed in EU countries
80
Piping and equipment
to check whether new designs and refurbishments comply with PED regulations.
Approved designs obtain a CE mark. In the Netherlands Lloyd’s Register
Stoomwezen is one of the Notified Bodies. If no harmonised EU codes exists for
a product or these are not used in the design then a Competent Body has to check
the design and help the producer prove compliance with EU directives.2 Under
the PED the producer of an installation has certain responsibilities, for example
the request for CE certification has to be made by the producer. It is sometimes
very difficult to indicate who the producer is. Is it the contractor who welds
something on a pipe? Is it the engineering company that has made the design or
perhaps the chemical company that uses the pipeline? The issues around who to
regard as the producer still had to be resolved at the time the PED was
introduced. According to the Stoomwezen the engineering company is the
producer.
Other regulations relevant to the design of (petro)chemical installations, are
those encompassing environmental regulations and regulations regarding noise
and smell. Such regulations are commonly used to regulate the outcome of the
design process. The installation should perform within in the limits of allowed
noise levels and emissions.
81
Ethical issues in engineering design
The contents of the codes differ. The American ASME codes are low-stress
codes. The stresses permitted in the materials are low. This means that American
constructions are heavier. The ASME codes require little testing and few
inspections once the system is in use. The ASME code is extensive, and the rules
are very detailed. The European codes (BS, Merkblätter, Regels) are high stress
codes. They allow higher stresses in the materials. A construction will probably
be lighter using European codes, but regular inspections and tests during use are
required on an ongoing basis.
——————————————————————————————————
3
The NEN formulates both codes and standards. The standards are primarily meant to lead to
interchangeability. The codes are used to guarantee levels of safety and quality, see also
section 6.3.
82
Piping and equipment
The organisation of the engineering company was as follows. The company had a
matrix organisation; this meant that there was line organisation in disciplines
and horizontal organisation in project teams. Every project team consisted of
people who were also part of a line organisation. A project manager would, at the
start of a design process, consult line managers about the people he or she
wanted in the project team. If the project was large, the project team members
were relocated to work in the same space. There was a clear division of labour
and function descriptions were clear.
Stress engineer: The stress engineer calculates the stresses in the pipes, the
stresses in the connections between pipes and vessels and the stresses the pipes
exert on the supporting structures. These calculations are made once there is a
plant lay-out. If the calculations show that stresses are too high, some changes in
the plant lay-out may have to be made. The calculations are made according to
codes. The codes used at the engineering company of the case-study are the
ASME code and the Dutch Stoomwezen Regels.
Materials engineer: The materials engineer chooses which materials are used in
an installation. Criteria used to choose materials are strength and chemical
resistance. He or she uses the ASME and American Society for Testing and
Materials (ASTM) codes and the Dutch Stoomwezen Regels.
83
Ethical issues in engineering design
walking through the installation or parts being taken apart are made. If the
piping designer notices problems, he or she confers with the stress engineer, the
job engineer and / or the materials engineer. At this stage of the design
accessibility and the ergonomics of the installation are important subjects.
84
Piping and equipment
decide what the possible and probable accident scenarios are and to what load
levels these scenarios will lead. This is related to the point made above about load
scenarios. However, accident scenarios are not limited to mechanical loads, they
also include human failure. An operator might, for example, forget to close a
valve. The accident scenario “forget to close a valve” should predict what happens
in such a case. In some cases an accident scenario can lead to a specific load
scenario. For example, if it is possible that a small scale explosion occurs in a
pressure vessel then the explosion inside the vessel should also be a load scenario
for the vessel. The decision as to what accident scenarios to include is ethically
relevant because an accident or incident not considered during the design pro-
cess can lead to a disaster. For example, a failure to close a valve could lead to an
explosion which could lead to the complete destruction of an installation. Some
accident scenarios are easy to decide to use because they are specified in the
codes. This, however, is not the case for all accident scenarios. An example of an
accident scenario that is not included in regulation is the water hammer scenario.
Accumulation of water in a steam line can lead to a build up of pressure released
as a sudden small explosion. This can cause a line to come loose from its
supporting structure if the attachment to the supporting structure is too weak for
such loads. Accidents due to a water hammer can lead to employees being stuck
under collapsed construction parts or employees being burned by hot steam or
water. Within the codes and regulations there are no explicit rules about how to
deal with water hammer hazard. The design team, especially the stress engineer,
has to decide whether or not to take it into account.
The calculations and load scenarios are checked by the Notified Body, but the
Notified Body is not allowed to check the risk analysis made by the engineering
design company under official PED rules. The Stoomwezen, however, checks risk
analyses and advises engineering companies on them.
The codes prescribe a lot of small details in the design process. If it is not
possible to follow the detailed rules of the codes then the codes give alternative
and less detailed ways of designing a pipe or pressure vessel. If the formulas
cannot be used in a specific case, then the use of finite element methods is
prescribed by the code. If the method of finite element calculation is also not
possible, the vessel can be designed and put through a pressure test. This last
alternative only prescribes the pressure test to which the vessel must be
subjected.
Following codes should lead to the minimum level of safety required by law.
In the European Union, the decision whether the design is indeed safe enough
from a legal point of view is made by Notified Bodies. There are possibilities to
deviate from codes if this is approved by the Notified Body and the customer.
Deviation from the codes and regulation could lead to unsafe installations. Such
85
Ethical issues in engineering design
decisions to not adhere to regulation or codes are therefore not taken lightly. An
example of not following the codes would be when a certain plastic can be used at
a maximum temperature of 280 °C. The codes also specify that if this plastic is
welded, the maximum allowable temperature is only 250 °C. It is forbidden by
the codes to use the welded plastic in an environment at 280 °C. In co-operation
with the Notified Body and the customer, the materials engineer can decide to
use the welded plastic in an installation that very rarely reaches 280 °C. In such a
case, the Notified Body will require that a prediction is made regarding how often
the temperature might exceed 250 °C, and for how long. Additional ageing of the
material due to a high temperature has to be taken into account in the calculation
of the lifetime of an installation. Plastic, as it ages, can become brittle, this can
lead to the rapid failure of plastic components making the use of particular types
of plastics, or welded plastics, less suitable in certain environments such as that
described above.
There is a difference in safety between a design that barely complies with a
code and a design made following the code in combination with the designer’s
experience and skill. All codes will contain specified margins. Designs that
comply with the lower boundary of the margins cannot be refused by the Notified
Bodies, but these designs are less safe than designs that fall well within the
limits. For example, a designer might insist on a greater than legally required
distance between a chlorine storage tank and the boundary fence of an
installation.4 A leak in such a tank could cause a cloud of chlorine gas to escape
and reach to publicly accessible roads; therefore there are legally binding minimal
safety distances between tanks containing chlorine and public places that must be
observed when designing a storage tank. In the case of chlorine storage it can be
said that the greater the distance between a storage tank and places to which the
public has access the safer it is. This means that although there is a minimum
safety distance, greater distances are usually better. Thus, though the distance
from a chlorine tank to a boundary beyond which the public have access might be
adequate from a legal point of view, the distance may not be enough from a
moral point of view.
86
Piping and equipment
place a new vessel within the installation without compromising minimum safety
distances. Safety distances are not only defined for vessels containing certain
dangerous chemicals and the boundaries of the chemical plant, safety distances
are also specified for distances between pipes and vessels and between different
vessels. A vessel under pressure might explode, if such an event occurs it should
not lead to additional problems. Other vessels should be placed at such a distance
that they are not affected by such an explosion.
Inconsistencies between codes and legislation are less prone to arise than
inconsistencies between customer requirements and codes and regulation.
Legislation and regulation are mostly goal based and codes usually apply to
hardware providing calculation rules that should lead to the performance levels
required by legislation and regulation. Therefore inconsistencies are not really an
issue. It can however, occur that new processes or materials have yet to be
codified and are therefore not automatically legal. In such cases it is sometimes
allowed to use those new processes or materials provided that a Notified Body has
explicitly allowed their use. A new material or process might be safer than those
specified in existing codes in certain instances. From a moral point of view it is
good to use new materials or processes if this enhances the safety of an
installation and has no other downsides e.g. with regard to sustainability.5 From a
legal point of view special permission has to be obtained to be allowed to use new
materials or processes. Duplex steel was, for example, not included in the Dutch
code (Regels), the Stoomwezen however allowed the use of duplex steel in certain
installations.
The interviewed engineers have indicated that the codes for (chemical)
installations are based on years of experience in the design of pipes etc, and that
they do not put these codes aside easily. If there are situations in which the code
is difficult to apply, an engineer will contact the Notified Body about what to do.
In the end, the decision as to whether a design is indeed safe enough is made by
a Notified Body such as the Stoomwezen. If a design is approved the product will
have the CE mark.
Another important issue in the final stages of the design process is the question
of whether an installation, as drawn with a computer can be actually built. It is
sometimes easier to leave the difficult details out of the drawings. These details
then have to be decided on site, during the actual construction of the installation,
where a piping designer from the engineering company must be present. A
question about responsibility can be discerned here. Are the engineers
——————————————————————————————————
5
Whether or not it is morally required to use new materials or processes if this enhances safety
depends also on other issues like amongst other things the costs and the environmental impact
of the new process or material.
87
Ethical issues in engineering design
88
Piping and equipment
Another ethical issue that was brought up by some of the interviewees is that
companies have less knowledge nowadays. Large chemical producing companies
no longer have engineering departments such departments have been outsourced
and/or closed. Engineering consultancy companies hire young engineers without
experience, experienced engineers are too expensive and they (have to) leave the
consultancy companies. Some organisations, to save money, for example the
Stoomwezen, have had a vacancy stop, no new people had been hired during six
years. The older engineers are retiring while the young engineers have not gained
a lot of experience. Moreover, internal education has been neglected. An
experienced engineer makes more money for a company when he or she is
working for a customer then when he or she is educating his or her younger
colleagues. This means that the knowledge and experience required to design
89
Ethical issues in engineering design
safely is declining, not only in the engineering companies, but also in the
Stoomwezen. The Stoomwezen does not have specialists in every field. They used
to rely on the knowledge and experience of the engineering departments of
(petro)chemical companies for some issues. In the past engineers from the
(petro)chemical companies had experience in working with, and designing for,
specific chemicals and the problems involved with handling such chemicals.
Approval by the Stoomwezen was partly based on it having positive experiences
with (petro)chemical companies and trusting the engineers of those companies to
make a safe and reliable design. Nowadays (petro)chemical companies do not
have an engineering department, this coupled with the retirement of experienced
engineers means that the knowledge and experience is no longer available in
engineering companies and at the Stoomwezen. This may cause problems in the
future when inexperienced engineers from an engineering company design an
installation for a (petro)chemical company that no longer retains knowledge and
experience with designing such installations. This may lead to unsafe designs. Of
course these designs have to be approved by the Notified Body but the
Stoomwezen has the same problem. Inspectors do not have knowledge of, and
experience with, the possible problems of all specific installations. So it is
questionable whether the Stoomwezen is always able to check whether a design is
safe enough, and if it is not safe enough, to provide advice to the engineering
company with respect to making it safer. If there is too little knowledge in
engineering design companies and in the organisation that has to certify the
designs, then unsafe chemical installation may be constructed, and this lack of
knowledge becomes an ethical issue.
The design process for piping and equipment in a (petro) chemical installation is
usually middle to low level normal design. The working principle and normal
configuration are already known. Pipes to transport fluids and gases have been
designed for some decades. In most design processes the functional
requirements are comparable to the functional requirements for previous
designs. In some design processes a more radical design might be needed if the
pipes have to transport a chemical that has not been used previously, research
into the effects of the chemical on the possible materials for pipes becomes
necessary. In the higher levels of the design hierarchy, the product to be
produced in the installation is designed, the flow of chemicals established and
the site selected. The design process is organised hierarchically people have
different functions and clear task descriptions and responsibilities.
90
Piping and equipment
91
Ethical issues in engineering design
92
Piping and equipment
From the above it can be seen that there is an extensive regulative framework but
that it is not a normative framework. The ambiguity of the regulative framework
93
Ethical issues in engineering design
is due to the change from national to European legislation and this may be
resolved within a few years time. Other problems arise as a result of a lack of
experience with and interpretation of, the PED. For example, the problem of who
should apply for the CE mark requires legal interpretation. These problems will
be resolved within some time. Other problems are more difficult. Notified
Bodies are not allowed to check the risk analysis provided by engineering
companies. This means that engineers can decide on accident scenarios without
guidelines or control on these decisions. This does not mean that engineers will
immediately try to set very low standards but they may be pushed by customers
only to consider some accident scenarios. From a moral point of view, the main
problem with the regulative framework would probably be that it is not accepted
and this is something that is not easily resolved. I will come back on this point in
chapter 9.
5.6 Acknowledgements
94
6 Designing a Bridge
Ethical issues with regard to the design of a bridge might not be that obvious. Yet,
safety plays an important part in the design process of a large bridge. Not just
safety for the people and drivers of the vehicles using the bridge but also for
workers working on the bridge during its construction and for ships passing
underneath a bridge. Accidents that happen on a bridge might lead to cars or
trucks hitting some structural part of the bridge. People might want to dive from
the bridge into the water, etc. A case-study about the design of a bridge is
presented in this chapter. The design problem is introduced in the first section.
The stakeholders and their wishes and requirements are introduced in the second
section. The main difficulty in this design process was trying to reconcile all the
requirements and wishes of all the stakeholders. The legislation and codes
pertaining to safety and sustainability for bridges form the focus of the third
section. These codes and legislation constitute the regulative framework for
bridge design. This section is followed by a section on the division of
responsibilities and the organisation of the design process for bridges. The
results are summarised and the regulative frameworks evaluated in section 6.5.
How far the regulative framework complies with Grunwald’s requirements and
can therefore be considered a normative framework is established.
95
Ethical issues in engineering design
The design process and construction of this large bridge will take years.
Therefore only one of the phases of the design process was studied. The phase of
the design process that I studied was the preliminary design phase. The IBA used
a standard contract made by a Dutch professional association for engineers that is
used mostly by engineering companies working within civil engineering in the
Netherlands. In this contract the design process is divided into the following
eight phases [KIvI, 2003]. The engineering company can be hired for one or more
of the phases of the design process.
Research: Research into the feasibility, environmental effects, societal acceptation
etc for making a go, no go decision for the project. This research is also used to
decide on design requirements.
Preliminary design: Based on the design requirements a sketch design and
descriptions on how the object will function are made and used to inform the
customer about the costs and the time necessary to build the design. The
customer has to approve the preliminary design before the next phase is started.
Definite design: The dimensions are fixed and the costs of materials and
apparatus indicated for use in the preliminary design are calculated (using codes
if necessary), drawn and specified. At the end of this phase there should be a
clear idea about what the costs to build and operate the object will be and the time
needed to build it.
Tender specification and construction documents: The location, the amount and
quality of materials and processes used to construct the object are described in
the tender specifications. The tender specifications also include administrative
and legal requirements. The tender specifications are necessary for tendering and
they will be used as part of the contract with the building contractor.
Price and contract: Building contractors bid to obtain the contract.
Detailing: The design is further detailed by the building contractor in co-
operation with the engineering company to ensure that it can be built according
to the tendering specifications.
Building: The engineering design company ensures that the design is built
according to the specifications in the tendering specifications.
——————————————————————————————————
1
For people who are familiar in the area, the bridge will connect IJburg with the A1 and A9
highway near exit Diemen.
96
Design of a bridge
The preliminary design phase started in January 2004 and was finished by the
end of April 2004. The phase resulted in a preliminary design report for the
customer. During the preliminary design phase I attended the technical meetings
and I interviewed five engineers and the architect working on the project. I will
explain more about the context of the design process in the next section, there the
stakeholders and the customer will be described.
The bridge should be constructed and be ready for use in 2007. A document
with the design requirements had already been written during the research phase
before the preliminary design phase. The IBA had participated in the research
phase and the writing of the requirements. Other stakeholders involved in the
research phase were the architect and the DRO, the municipal organisation for
planning and urbanism. The preliminary design of this bridge is high to middle
level design, it is somewhat lower in design hierarchy than the conceptual design
of the bridge but it is the first effort to make a design of the construction of the
bridge based on the architect’s drawings of the desired shape of the bridge.
Designing this bridge is a normal design process. In this regard the bridge is
just another arched bridge although it is a rather large one. The working
principle, how arched bridges work, and normal configuration, what they look
like, are well known. The architect tried to make the working principle of the
arched bridge visible in its shape. In an arched bridge there are either strong and
heavy arches to support the mass or there are two strong beams at either side of
the bridge deck that carry most of the loads. In this case the architect had chosen
to use heavy arches. In short the design problem is: build a beautiful arched
bridge that is not too expensive and that does not hinder ships during
construction or while in use. Take all legislation into account and take care that
no one gets injured or killed during construction.
The difficulty in this design process is not in designing a new working
principle or a new configuration; it is in combining and meeting all
requirements, in the coordination of all the different tasks and in maintaining the
communication between all the stakeholders. A lot of stakeholders are involved:
among others two municipalities, a power station, an architect, the municipal
service for urban development, and the Rijkswaterstaat.2 All these stakeholders
——————————————————————————————————
2
The design process is at the time not finished. After the preliminary design phase the design
process was temporarily stopped. There were some financial problems concerning IJburg and
the customer needed to deal with them. The customer probably also needs to get the
permission of the Amsterdam city council to expand the budget for the bridge.
97
Ethical issues in engineering design
have their wishes, requirements and demands that need to be incorporated in the
design. Some stakeholders need to give their permission because they own part
of the land on which the bridge will be build. Different permits from local and
national authority are necessary before the actual building can start. As the rest of
this chapter will show, the design process is also governed by a lot of legislation
and codes pertaining to the design and the building of bridges.
98
Design of a bridge
Other stakeholders:
The Rijkswaterstaat: The Rijkswaterstaat is a government organisation
responsible for the Dutch waterways, dikes, dams and canals. The
Rijkswaterstaat imposes rules for minimising the radar disturbance caused by a
bridge. Once a bridge is built there should still be enough vision and radar vision
downstream. The Rijkswaterstaat also imposes limits on the amount of
disturbance to shipping during the construction of a bridge. One side of the
bridge in the case will stand on a important dam controlled by the
Rijkswaterstaat. Another part of the Rijkswaterstaat, the Civil Engineering
Division (Rijkswaterstaat Bouwdienst), checks the calculations for the bridge.
The IBA has hired the Rijkswaterstaat Civil Engineering Division as advisor.
The Reliant Energy: This company has a power station near the bridge site. Road
embankments are necessary between the bridge and the connecting roads
because of the height of the bridge. One of the road embankments will be on
Reliant Energy’s land, so permission is required to build on this land. The
Reliant Energy also has a dock that the contractor might want to use to transport
materials to the building site, thus the construction company needs to obtain
permission from the Reliant Energy to use the dock.
The TENET: There are high voltage transmission lines above part of the bridge
and part of the terrain needed to build the bridge. Building underneath high
voltage lines imposes specific hazards on people working on such a site. It will
also make building the bridge upstream and shipping it to the site difficult. It
will not be possible to load the already constructed bridge onto a ship and
transport it into position because it is not possible for a ship with the bridge on it
to pass under the power lines. The TENET might be willing to cut the power
through the lines if the power demand is low during certain hours of the day or
for some months. Whether or not this is possible has to be discussed with the
TENET.
The Municipality Diemen: Part of the bridge will be on land owned by the
municipality Diemen, so their permission to build is needed.
The Architect: The customer has hired an architect for the architectural design of
the bridge. The architect had already performed a study for the DRO concerning
bridges in IJburg.
The Groengebied: On one side of the Amsterdam-Rijnkanaal, (the Diemer side)
there is a nature reserve. The Groengebied manages this area. The Groengebied
has to give permission before the building can start. The Groengebied will
amongst other things, need to check whether animals can still get from one side
of the earth embankment to the other.
The Provincie North Holland: The Netherlands are divided in 12 provinces. A
province has its own council and is responsible for spatial planning, for part of
99
Ethical issues in engineering design
the Dutch infrastructure and Dutch water management, therefore the Provincie
North Holland also has to approve the building of the bridge.
All the above organisations, the municipal services and companies, had their
own wishes, demands and requirements. Some of these requirements were
incorporated in the design requirements. In other instances there was only an
indication that permission needed to be obtained from an organisation to do
something or that an organisation should be contacted.
Some of these organisations may have demands that will cause serious
problems later. For example, the customer and the IBA did not contact the
Reliant Energy in the preliminary design phase, yet an engineer from the IBA
had heard that the Reliant Energy had indicated some time ago that they would
not allow an earth embankment of several metres high to be built over their
cables. According to the engineer, this information had been obtained in an
earlier phase of planning for the IJburg estate. If the Reliant Energy refuses to
give permission for the road embankment then the bridge design will need to be
changed. The design team was waiting for another project, the road leading to
the bridge, to be started before they would talk to the Reliant Energy. This road
project was to be carried out by another design team within IBA. This division of
projects into the bridge and the roads on the Diemer and IJburger side was
apparently due to separated budgets for the whole project at the OGA.
Another problem may arise with the DIVV. Facilities for maintenance and
inspection of bridges are necessary, such as stairs, rails or perhaps a cart that can
be moved along the bottom of the bridge to inspect or paint it. In most design
processes that the IBA had participated in, in the past, the DIVV was involved.
During the bridge design process the DIVV was officially not involved, yet after
the bridge has been built, it will be handed over to the DIVV. The engineers of
the design team were experienced and they knew most of the facilities required
for maintenance. However, to prevent problems later on in the design process
the engineers from IBA asked the DIVV for advice on facilities necessary for
maintenance. A facility can be easily included in earlier phases of the design
process, at the end of the design process it is more difficult to include a facility
for maintenance. It might then be necessary to change the design and to
perform further calculations.
Tension can arise between the architect and the engineering design company.
Both the engineers and architect thought that this tension was necessary to come
to a good design. According to the engineers and the architect, the architect
should try to push the engineers to the limit as to what is possible for
100
Design of a bridge
engineering work.3 The regulative framework poses some of the limits of what is
possible in the engineering work. The architect defended his ideas about what
the bridge should look like and he did not like compromises. The architect is
well-known in the Netherlands and he has experience with designing bridges..
The architectural design specified the way the bridge should look and it dealt
with the shape and form of the bridge. The engineering design dealt with the
bridge’s construction. The engineers tried to make an engineering design that
fitted the architectural design In this phase of the design process the architect
led, with the engineers staying as close as possible to the architectural design.
The customer had asked the design team, during the preliminary design phase,
to look for options to lower the costs of the bridge without compromising the
architectural design. The architect and customer judged whether the proposals
made by the design team were within the scope of the architectural design or
would change the architectural design intolerably.
Within the IBA a number of engineers drawn from different disciplines worked
on the engineering design, two engineers worked on the steel arches and two
engineers worked on the concrete foundations and pillars. Furthermore, three
engineers were involved with the preparation of the building site and methods
that would be used during construction. One of the engineers working on
preparation of the building site was also delegated to make a health and safety
document for the bridge project.
A design leader and a project leader had been appointed. The project leader
communicated with the other stakeholders, especially the customer. One of the
engineers designing the steel parts was also the design leader. The design leader
was responsible for the exchange of information between the different engineers
and the architect. The design and project leader were jointly responsible for the
integration of the preliminary design and the preliminary design report. Every
two weeks there was a design meeting for the purpose of exchanging
information. The design leader had made a decision document for the next
design phase. Every engineer had to fill in the form when they made a decision.
The decision, the reasons for the decision and additionally the engineers from
other disciplines whose work will be influenced by the decision had to be noted
on the form. These decision forms were then sent to the design leader and the
other relevant groups.
——————————————————————————————————
3
This remains normal design because “pushing to the limits” in this case means within the
normal configuration and working principle. The architect and engineers seem to refer to, for
example, thinner arches or less bulky looking road segments.
101
Ethical issues in engineering design
A bridge should be safe and comply to all relevant bridge legislation. The safety
of the design for a bridge should be demonstrated before permission for
construction is given. Engineers can indicate that the design is safe by
demonstrating that they have followed the relevant codes and complied to
legislation. Safety consists of different aspects with regards to a bridge. The
different aspects were identified by looking at the relevant legislation and codes
and interviewing the project manager before the observation period started.
One, it is desirable that the bridge can be built without any workers being
injured or any fatalities. Accidents happen regularly during construction work.
People fall down from heights, they get stuck under heavy construction parts,
they can be hit by falling parts. These kinds of accidents should be prevented if
possible for example by limiting the amount of work that needs to be done at a
height and ensuring that safety features are built into the design.
Two, the bridge should be strong enough to withstand all normal loading
during the whole of its lifetime and all exceptional loading that might occur
during accidents.
Three, the IJburg bridge is quite high above the water level and the arches are
also high. People on the bridge might throw things down onto ships or climb
onto the arches. All kinds of misuse can be imagined.
Four, to prevent collisions between ships on the canal, the line of sight from
ships and radar scanning should not be hindered by the bridge.
In the following sub-sections I will come back to all these points and indicate
how the engineers dealt with all these aspects of bridge safety. I will divide the
aspects into safety during use and safety during construction, because different
legislation and codes hold for use and construction.
102
Design of a bridge
physical loads or to protect pregnant or young employees. There are for example
rules about lifting loads and the mass that bricks are allowed to have. The design
team did not know these rules and therefore did not use them in the design.
They considered that compliance with these substantial rules was part of the
responsibilities of the contractor, because the contractor is the employer at the
building site. This is also regarded as the responsibility of the employer in the
working conditions decree.
Until recently engineering design companies included a very general list of
risks as a health and safety plan with the tendering specifications. Things like
the possibility of workers falling from heights or the obligation to use personal
protection like safety shoes or a safety helmet were mentioned. Design decisions
cannot be changed once this tendering phase is reached. Some risks might be
preventable if another choice is made in an earlier design process phase. The
idea behind the obligation to make a health and safety plan during the design is
that health and safety considerations should play a part during the whole of the
design process and not just during construction when most of the decisions have
already been made. Nowadays more attention is given to the formulation of the
health and safety plan within the IBA; it is no longer a standard list. Whereas the
health and safety plan used to be made at the end of the design process it is now
started in the preliminary design phase and it is updated throughout the design
process. This bridge project was the first time that engineers from the IBA
worked on a health and safety plan in the preliminary design phase. Risks were
listed and possible measures to prevent or mitigate such risks were mentioned
together with whether the measures had already been taken or had to be taken
later in the design phase. All risks and measures were listed in the health and
safety plan of the bridge with an indication that something should be done about
it in a later phase. It can be concluded that making a health and safety plan
during the preliminary design phase has not led to changes in the preliminary
design.
A health and safety plan is also necessary for maintenance and refurbishment.
This means that a new plan needs to be made when maintenance work is done.
The IBA engineers do not make this health and safety plan, the contractor for
maintenance is responsible for this, however, the IBA engineers were aware that
their construction should not only be build but also inspected and maintained.
This meant that perhaps stairs, rails, provisions to secure a safety line when
working on heights, manholes and elevators needed to be included. In this case
the IBA engineers asked the DIVV for advice as to what inspection and
maintenance provisions were needed.
103
Ethical issues in engineering design
104
Design of a bridge
105
Ethical issues in engineering design
the amount of material required to build the bridge. The preliminary design was
calculated using NEN 6723 and NEN 6788, because the calculations were
preliminary and only general, no details were known at the time, it was not
necessary to continue to use the NEN 6723 and 6788 codes in further design
phases. The Rijkswaterstaat Civil Engineering Division, which was asked by the
IBA to check its calculations, had a strong preference for the European code. The
IBA engineers were undecided as to which code they wanted to use. They knew
the NEN 6723 and 6788 very well and had a lot of experience in using them.
Using the European code would require them getting to know that code and
might cost more calculation time. The engineers did not decide which code to
use in the definite design phase; the customer, the OGA, had to decide this.
Because the engineers did not know what the consequences of using the
European code were they made a quick analysis, which was incorporated in the
preliminary design report. The customer could choose based on this analysis. In
the analysis the following arguments were given for and against using the green
version of the European code [Aalstein, 2004].
‘-The prediction of the fatigue loads are more accurate in the European
code.
-Using the European code the non-permanent loads are higher.5 The
total loads, the combination of non-permanent and permanent loads,
however, is lower due to lower safety factors
-Using the European code the dynamic fatigue loads are higher and
can be decisive for minimal thicknesses. The stresses calculated in the
preliminary design phase are low enough to assume that the
preliminary design will also suffice according to the European code.
-The financial consequences of using the European code will be
limited. In total the use of the European code can even lead to the use
of less material.’ [Aalstein, 2004]
Considering all these arguments the IBA advised OGA to choose the European
code.
Besides having to choose between NEN codes or the European code, a choice
needed to be made between different types of codes for some parts of the bridge.
For example, the design involved making a wall on either side of the canal to act
as a support for the bridge and keep soil from sliding into the canal. What is the
primary function of such a wall? If the primary function is to support the road
then the calculations should be made using construction codes. If the primary
function of the wall is to keep the soil from sliding into the canal then
——————————————————————————————————
5
Non-permanent loads are loads caused by traffic on the bridge, loads caused by snow or
temperature differences and other non-permanent conditions. Permanent loads are loads
caused by such things as the weight of the bridge, creep and uneven settlement.
106
Design of a bridge
geotechnical codes could be used. These codes differ and can lead to different
required material thicknesses and qualities. In the construction codes the
principal loads are vertical and come from the road onto the wall. Using a
geotechnical code the principal loads will be horizontal, and due to the force
exerted by the soil which will push against the wall. According to the engineers
interviewed it is uncommon for a choice to have to be made between different
types of codes but it does occur as it did in the bridge case. The engineers
indicated that what code is chosen for the calculations is based on experience
with similar situations.
People and drivers on the bridge participate in traffic, thus, all traffic safety
legislation is relevant for a road bridge. All the requirements pertaining to traffic
safety, such as the width of the bridge, protecting of cyclists and pedestrians
from cars and illuminating the roads, must be included in the design process.
The IBA did not design the road deck on the bridge, this was the responsibility
of the DRO. The IBA only made the engineering design for the bridge. Because
exact division of the bridge into road, pavement, cycle path etc was not done by
the IBA and was not that important with regard to the construction of the bridge
I will not get into the details of regulation and codes pertaining to road. It was,
however, important for this engineering design to take into account the fact that
traffic accidents can happen on a bridge. A car or truck might crash into the
guard rail on one of the sides of the bridge or crash into a load bearing structure
of a bridge. A bridge should not collapse in such exceptional circumstances. The
codes include rules for calculations that should be made to simulate cars or
trucks crashing into the load bearing structures of the bridge and for trucks
standing very near to the sides of a bridge.
The IJburg bridge will be partly on publicly accessible terrain, so it is possible for
people to access all parts of the bridge. People will be walking or cycling on the
bridge. The bridge will be about 9 meters above water level and the arches will
be about 22 meters above the bridge deck. The building decree requires that
preventive measures should be in place to prevent people being blown of the
bridge in high winds. To protect cyclists and pedestrians on the bridge a rail will
be installed on the bridge, using building decree guidelines.
In the preliminary design phase no measures to prevent people from
climbing on the arches were taken into account. One of the engineers said in an
interview that he thought that something should be done to prevent people from
climbing onto the arches because the arches were not steep, the inclination is
such that it might be possible to walk on the arch. The arches of some arched
bridges are so steep that it is impossible to climb on them. In this case, the
engineer thought that a gate to prevent people from walking onto the arch might
107
Ethical issues in engineering design
be needed. There are no rules or codes that specify that arches should be
inaccessible. After my presentation of the results of the case-study there was a
discussion on this issue of misuse. In that discussion, an engineer said that
walking on the arch to the top (about 30 m above water level) was a stupid thing
to do. He thought that they should try to keep people off the arches, but not at
any cost. In the engineers’ opinion people themselves have a responsibility to be
prudent and realise that climbing on the unprotected arches of a bridge is a
dangerous thing to do. The engineers agreed that in postponing the discussion
on this point, they risked that later on in the design process they would need to
make large changes to the arches to prevent people from walking on them. In
the case of a bridge in the Dutch city Maastricht the arch of a bridge for
pedestrians and cyclists is not very steep (see figure 6.1). Since the opening of
the bridge in 2003, there have been at least five known attempts to walk over the
arch. The city council is considering installing CCTV cameras and claiming any
would be daredevils the costs of any resulting rescue operations
[www.frontpage.fok.nl] and [Algemeen Dagblad, 30 March 2005].
108
Design of a bridge
Figure 6.1a and b: Bridge for pedestrians and cyclists in Maastricht. People
climb on the arch and sometimes try to walk to the other side using the arch
[photos A. van Gorp].
109
Ethical issues in engineering design
design leader thought / hoped that the Rijkswaterstaat would give them
comments and advice on misuse. The question remains whether the architect
would accept a gate or some other measure to keep people off the arch. This
might become a problem later on in the design process.
The engineers considered all the mentioned aspects to be important but during
the case-study design process when using the term “safety” they usually referred
only to safety in use. Safety during construction is called health and safety.
6.3.3 Sustainability
Some of the engineers mentioned in their interviews that the estate and the
bridge would be built in a former nature park. They thought that the
environment and especially building in a nature park was an ethically relevant
issue. The decision to develop an estate in a nature park was taken by the
Amsterdam city council. This was an important ethical issue but not one that the
engineers could really influence. The Amsterdam city council held a referendum
in 1997 to ask the Amsterdam community whether or not they agreed with the
110
Design of a bridge
——————————————————————————————————
6
The Forest Stewardship Council is an international, non-profit organization that offers forest
certification. FSC has developed some principles and criteria that should be met. The principles
and criteria take into account the environmental impacts of forest management and social
issues like labor conditions and indigenous peoples’ rights [www.fsc.org].
111
Ethical issues in engineering design
materials was not made in the preliminary design phase. In a discussion held
during the preliminary design phase where sustainability might have been
relevant, the engineer said that new legislation was anticipated. This legislation
will limit the amount of volatile substances allowed in paints and it will be in
force when the bridge is built. The discussion on paints took place when the
means for conserving and maintaining of the steel arches was discussed. A
conservation system consisting of a metallic coating, for example zinc, and paint
is required in the requirements. This form of conservation system is very
expensive and the OGA wanted a cheaper conservation system. According to the
engineers from the IBA the conservation system using a metal layer and paint
was perhaps too expensive and over engineered. They agreed with the OGA that
it might suffice to have another, cheaper system. The IBA engineers, however,
wanted to look at more than the costs of paints and their application, they also
wanted to reduce maintenance requirements. They decided to look for an
organic paint system that conserves the steel arches of the bridge as well as the
systems used to conserve similar large bridges. One of the engineers contacted
different paint producers to determine what kinds of organic paints would be
suitable for the bridge, he also mentioned in a design meeting that when the
bridge was painted in 2007 there would be new legislation covering a reduction
of volatile substances in paints. The organic paint system that he advised using
complies with the upcoming legislation.
The IBA is NEN-EN-ISO 9001:2000 certified. This quality system requires that
every calculation and drawing is checked. Every official document must have the
signatures of the engineer that has written it and the engineer that has checked
appended. The responsibility for calculations is thus divided between two
engineers; the one that has performed the calculations and one that has checked
them. After the document has been checked the project leader has to append his
signature for release to the customer or other external instances. This system
should make all decisions traceable. The NEN-EN–ISO certificate is a quality
system that focuses mainly on procedures.
In the interviews I asked the engineers whether the checking and signing of
documents were related to liability issues. The engineers did not know if this was
the case and started asking me whether they could be held liable in cases where
they had signed some calculation or other documents. There is very little
information on engineers being held liable if people are injured or killed due to a
design flaw. There have been very few cases in which an engineer has been sued
and convicted. Most cases have been settled or the engineers were acquitted. For
112
Design of a bridge
example, in a court case involving three engineers that had worked, in different
organisations, on the wheels of the ICE train that crashed into a bridge at
Eschede in Germany severe guild could not be proven and the case was settled
[Oberlandesgerichtcelle, 2003]. After a new hall at the Charles-de-Gaulle airport
near Paris in France had collapsed on the 23rd of May 2004, the district attorney
announced that an investigation into involuntary manslaughter would be made
[Doden na instorten vertrekhal Parijs, 2004]. It is not yet clear whether some
companies, engineers or the architect will be held liable.
In general there are three criteria used to decide whether persons can be held
liable. A norm has to be transgressed, there should be a causal connection
between this transgression and the failure and a person should be blameworthy
[Bovens, 1998, 28-31].7 Because there are not a lot of cases in which engineers are
convicted for design flaws causing death or injuries to third parties, it is not clear
how these criteria are interpreted.
Liability for design omissions is regulated in the contract between the customer
and the IBA, [KIvI, 2003]. A design omission is defined as something that a
good, prudent engineering company, that has the relevant knowledge and means,
should have avoided. The customer has to point out the design omission to the
engineering company and give the company time to amend it. The engineering
company is liable for the cost of amending the design omission and any damage
directly related to the design omission. The maximum amount to be paid by the
engineering company is the amount that the engineering company will be paid
for the assignment with a maximum of 1 million euros. Thus liability is limited to
1 million euros and only direct damage is covered. In this contract the
engineering company is not liable if people are killed or injured as a result of the
finished object collapsing or otherwise seriously malfunctioning.
The arched design of the IJburg bridge was clearly a normal design. The working
principle and normal configuration for an arched bridge are well known.
Functionally, the design was also normal, the requirements formulated for this
bridge were not exceptional compared to other arched bridges. I studied the
——————————————————————————————————
7
Following the codes is usually a way to show that the design complies with the law. It is
however not this straightforward, if a design complies with the codes it does not necessarily
mean that no norm has been transgressed, because the use of codes is not required by law. An
object should meet the requirements of the Dutch building decree. Usually following the codes
will lead to compliance but an obviously unsafe object transgresses the law even if it is
designed using the codes.
113
Ethical issues in engineering design
preliminary design phase for a bridge that would form part of a larger system of
roads to link IJburg to the rest of Amsterdam. The task was high to middle level
in the design hierarchy. It was not really a conceptual design because the
architectural image of the bridge and the requirements for the bridge had been
previously decided. At the stage I observed it was not a detailed design, details
would be added in the definitive design phase, in the tendering specifications
phase and probably also by the contractor after tendering.
114
Design of a bridge
115
Ethical issues in engineering design
What misuse should be accounted for in the design was not made clear in the
preliminary design phase.8 It is quite possible for aesthetics and safety concerns
to clash on this point: because the arches were not very steep, people would be
able to walk on them once the bridge is built. If this is to be prevented, a gate
should be built or some other measure taken to keep people from climbing on
the arch. Such a gate may disturb the architectural image of the bridge. The IBA
engineers did not include any preventive measures regarding arch climbing in
the preliminary design. The engineers did indicate that they were responsible for
a design with rails so that people could not be blown from the bridge in high
winds. The building decree gives some rules for this. There are, however, no
rules or guidelines for preventing people from climbing on potentially
dangerous structures, from throwing things onto ships or from diving from the
bridge into the water.
The IJburg bridge would form part of a public space. This is probably one of the
reasons why there was no real tension between costs and safety. The engineers
indicated that the customer and every other stakeholder were sensitive to safety
concerns regarding the bridge. If the engineers gave clear argumentation as to
why a certain idea or option was not safe enough, then the idea or option was not
used. Every stakeholder wanted the bridge to be safe. The aim was that the
bridge should be safe, yet built as cheaply as possible within the architectural
design.
——————————————————————————————————
8
Note that movable bridges are subjected to the European Machinery Directive [98/37/EC]. A
Dutch code for movable bridges, NEN 6787, includes some rules on possible misuse of movable
bridges and access to movable parts [NEN 6787, 2004].
116
Design of a bridge
site or vice versa. So although the engineers worked in one field they needed to
be informed about what the other engineers had decided and designed.
Because of the division of labour different engineers dealt with different
ethical issues. For example, the engineers working on the concrete parts had to
deal with issues like which type of codes to choose for some of the concrete
parts. Although every engineer was expected to take working conditions into
account and make a list of risks, the primary responsibility for health and safety
during construction was placed on the engineer making the health and safety
plan. The engineers working on the steel arches will be confronted with issues of
misuse and have to decide on what misuse to prevent in later phases of the
design process. Ethical issues were primarily dealt with by one or two engineers
working on a subject. If ethical issues were problematic or any choices the
engineers made were expected to influence other parts of the bridge then choices
were discussed with the other design team members.
The choice between using European codes and NEN codes had to be taken by
the customer supported by argumentation provided by the design team. The
Rijkswaterstaat Civil Engineering Division was asked to check the construction
design of the bridge. The IBA was not required to have the Rijkswaterstaat check
the construction design, however, the engineers wanted this because the
Rijkswaterstaat has a lot of experience with designing large bridges.
When deciding about ethical (and other) issues reference was made to
elements of what I have called regulative frameworks. The regulative
frameworks provided operationalisations, calculation rules, minimal
requirements etc that were used by the engineers in the design process.
——————————————————————————————————
9
There are of course overlaps between the two frameworks especially with regards to safety
during maintenance. The building decree also sets out requirements for accessibility for
maintenance.
117
Ethical issues in engineering design
regulative framework, one that deals with the level of hindrance that a bridge is
allowed to cause ships in a canal, river or harbour.
I will start with a discussion of some aspects of the regulative framework
concerning safety during construction. Dutch legislation on working conditions
is an implementation of European directives 89/391/EC (health and safety at
work in general) and 92/57/EC (health and safety on construction sites). The law
on working conditions is very general and only states goals, for example that an
employee should not be put at risk. However, the law is supplemented with
several policy rules, rules on fines for breaches of safety regulation, rules for
inspection of working conditions etc. All these rules are much more detailed and
are supplemented by ideas on how to interpret the rules, law etc [Wilders, 2004].
The complete Dutch working conditions regulation system constitutes a
regulative framework.
The IBA engineers only used part of this regulative framework, they only
made the required health and safety plan. The rest of the regulative framework,
such as the more detailed rules, was not considered by the engineers. The IBA
engineers only carried out the requirement to make a health and safety plan
because they considered the rest outside the scope of engineering design. The
law also assigns only this specific responsibility to the designing engineers. The
complete regulative framework is relevant for contractors not for designing
engineers according to the IBA engineers.
I will not go into the question of whether or not the regulative framework
concerning working conditions is a normative framework. I conclude that the
regulative framework was not used by engineers in this case. Engineers have a
task assigned to them by the regulative framework but because the task is
limited and procedural they can perform this task without using the rest of the
framework. If a health and safety plan made by design engineers does not
contribute to better working conditions on a building site then it might be a good
idea to assign more substantial responsibilities to the design engineers
concerning working conditions. This would force the engineers to use the
regulative framework concerning working conditions.
There is also a regulative framework for road design. This regulative
framework requires, amongst other things, minimum widths of roads. The
requirements from the road design framework are decisive for the width of a
bridge. So although the engineers did not work within the road design regulative
framework their work was influenced by some of its rules. With regard to the
possible regulative framework concerning hindrance of ships on canals, rivers
and in harbours, the same holds. The IBA engineers only knew some of the
rules and just sent their design to the Rijkswaterstaat to be controlled. The IBA
engineers therefore did not use all of the rules or legislation concerning the
118
Design of a bridge
The directive that gives detailed requirements for construction products should
lead to constructions that fulfil these general requirements.
The Dutch building decree mentions the European directive on construction
products, but its focus is on constructions as a whole. Some parts of the building
decree requirements are very detailed; others refer to codes for details. The codes
referred to are Dutch NEN codes or already European harmonized EN-NEN
codes. Most national codes should in the end be harmonized within the
European Union to ensure a free European market.
119
Ethical issues in engineering design
120
Design of a bridge
codes but the fatigue cracks were found and repaired before an accident
happened (see section 6.3.2).
Observed: The framework is observed this observation is partly due to the fact
that designs are checked before building permits are issued. The fact that
observation of the building decree is legally required does not seem to be the
only reason for engineers to observe the framework. The IBA engineers wanted
to design a safe bridge, they feel responsible for this and were convinced that
observing the framework is a good way to design a safe bridge.
The regulative framework meets most of the requirements, at least partly, but
not completely. So this regulative framework approaches a normative
framework, but, sensus strictus, it is not a normative framework. This framework
is contrary to the regulative framework pertaining to cars and the regulative
framework pertaining to piping and equipment design, at least with regard to
bridge design widely accepted. There will be some problems because the
framework will be ambiguous once a green version of the European code is
available, but this will only be temporary. The framework will not be
pragmatically complete until some guidelines on misuse of structures are
included.
6.6 Acknowledgements
I would like to thank the architect Wim Quist and the engineers at IBA for their
co-operation during the case-study.
121
7 Design of a lightweight trailer
Engineer: I can’t really think of any ethical issues related to trucks and trailers, they are
not murder weapons. I know cyclists get killed by trucks but….yeah well that has
nothing to do with ethics.
The engineer above relates ethics to murdering people. According to him ethical
issues are involved when designing products that (are intended to) kill people. He
acknowledges that some people die in traffic because of accidents involving
trucks but, as he indicates, a truck is not a murder weapon and thus there are no
ethical issues involved in truck and trailer design. In the Netherlands each year
more people are killed in accidents involving a truck than are murdered by
someone using a firearm (numbers from Dutch Statistical Database (CBS)
[statline, 2003] and SWOV (Dutch Society for Scientific Research on Traffic
safety) [www.swov.nl] and [Van Kampen, 2003]). The difference is that truck
drivers usually do not intend to kill other road users but the construction and
mass of a truck give other road users little chance of surviving an accident
involving a collision with a truck. So even if ethics is limited to designs, that due
to design features, can kill someone then the designing of trucks includes ethical
issues.
The design process that is the focus of this chapter is a preliminary design
process for a trailer. The design problem will be introduced in the first section.
The way in which decisions are made is described in the second section. In this
case the design process was performed for a customer. The focus of the third
section is on the safety of the trailer. This section is quite elaborate because a lot
of information is necessary to understand how the engineers define safety and
why they define it in such a way. The engineers do not feel responsible for traffic
safety. In this case a clear ascription of responsibilities by engineers can be seen,
as will be shown in section 7.4. The government, the driver or the customer
should be responsible for traffic safety according to the engineers. A summary of
the results is given in section 7.5. In contrast to the other chapters, this chapter
will not include a separate section on sustainability. In my opinion such a section
would not add anything new to what has been said in other cases. Sustainability
is again not deemed important (see chapter 5 and 6). So although they designed a
lightweight truck the engineers and customer thought this had little to do with
sustainability. The problems concerning sustainability and lightweight
technologies, such as the difficulties encountered when recycling lightweight
materials are discussed more thoroughly in chapter 4.
123
Ethical issues in engineering design
124
Design of a lightweight trailer
produced. The term “produced” had different meanings for the customer and
the engineers. The engineers specified a way in which the trailer could be
produced and calculated the material costs to estimate the costs. The customer
expected that CLC would contact companies about producing, for example, the
side panels and the floor. For him a trailer is producible once he knows that
companies will produce the parts he needs for a reasonable price. These
differences regarding the meaning of “producible” may have contributed to the
customer’s decision to stop the design process after the preliminary design
phase.
Transport in Europe is a highly competitive business; profit margins are
small. Every tonne of freight that can be transported extra increases a company’s
profit margins. The motivation to have a lightweight trailer is mostly economic.
Lighter trailers use less fuel if driven empty and can transport more load before
exceeding loading regulations. The total mass bearing on the axles of a truck and
trailer is limited to 9 tonnes and the total mass of a truck, trailer and load
combination is also regulated by national laws. The mass of the total combination
is not allowed to exceed 44 tonnes in the Netherlands, in Germany it is 40
tonnes.1 In a few years these national laws will be substituted by a European law.
The maximum mass permitted for truck, trailer and load will be around 40
tonnes. A mass reduction of 1000 kg for the physical trailer means that an
additional 1000 kg of freight can be transported. The motivation for lightweight
design is therefore not to obtain a more sustainable trailer but to transport more
load.
The lightweight trailer had to be designed for use behind conventional
European trucks. The truck-trailer configuration would stay more or less the
same. The trailer had to comply with existing regulations for traffic, and it was
expected to include a new unloading system leading to some changes in the
normal configuration of the trailer. The materials that the engineers proposed
have not yet been widely used in trailer production. The CLC has designed a
cooling trailer using composites. However, a cooling trailer has a roof, whereas
trailers for bulk load such as sand and agricultural products do not have a roof.
Having a roof closes the perimeter and provides for a torsionally stiff box, so
having no roof is very important for stiffness calculations. The normal
configuration of a bulk transport trailer was changed to include a new unloading
——————————————————————————————————
1
The maximum total loads of truck and trailer combinations and axles loading are based on
information obtained from the engineers and the customer. In a version of the Dutch “voertuig-
reglement”, I found a maximum of 10 tonnes on axles [voertuigreglement, 2005]. This
difference is probably due to harmonization in the European Union. The maximum load on axles
and the maximum total load of truck trailer combinations will eventually become the same
throughout Europe. The engineers and customer possibly anticipate the lower, harmonized,
masses that will eventually be enforced.
125
Ethical issues in engineering design
system and “new” materials were used to built it. Therefore I considered this
design process to be radical. The design hierarchy is somewhere middle level. As
said before, the trailer should be part of a conventional truck and trailer couple.
The preliminary design of the trailer was therefore a middle level design, it is a
product in its own right but it has to be used with another existing product, the
truck.
The design methods used by CLC are not widely used in trailer design. There
are trailer producing companies that use these techniques but most small trailer
producers build trailers using experience. If an aluminium panel of 5 mm
suffices then perhaps next time a trailer producer will try a 4.5 mm thick panel.
The customer has an important role in the decision making process. The
customer’s role will be outlined in this section. This will be followed by a
description of the decision making process that took place between the engineers
when the customer was absent.
The customer had decided that he wanted a lightweight, preferably composite
trailer for his new unloading floor system. The customer had developed a new
loading/unloading system. This system makes it possible to load pallets or bulk
material in the same trailer. Flexibility in what load to transport reduces the
number of kilometres driven with an empty trailer. To get an idea of the
loading/unloading system that had to be incorporated in the trailer see figures
7.1a and 7.1b).2 It can be argued that it is more economical and perhaps even
more sustainable, if trailers are always driven with a load on board instead of
driving from A to B with a load and back to A empty.
——————————————————————————————————
2
Both figures are only meant to show the loading system, the trailer itself was not designed
when these drawings were made. The eventual trailer might look quite different from these
drawings but the loading/unloading system showed here will be part of the trailer. The pictures
are taken from a promotional booklet and are reprinted here with the customer’s consent.
126
Design of a lightweight trailer
Figure 7.1 a and b: Loading and unloading a bulk load. Goods on pallets are
loaded from the door at the back. The floor slides to the front with the pallets on
it [pictures courtesy of Ruflo].
The requirements for the trailer were established in the first meeting. This was
done in co-operation between customer and engineering company, where the
customer decided what to incorporate in the design requirements. The engineers
introduced ideas and arguments about what requirements to include. The
customer decided to follow the engineers’ ideas if he was convinced they were
workable. According to the engineers the customer had to decide what the
requirements would be because the customer would pay for the project. However,
this view is a bit simplistic: the customer came to the engineering company for
127
Ethical issues in engineering design
advice and he had to pay for that, hence, the customer expected input from the
engineers.
The requirements were listed in a table. Most of the requirements were
specific and measurable, for example the maximum mass of the trailer was to be
5000 kg, the inside volume of the trailer should be 2.47*2.75*13.67 m3, the trailer
lifetime was specified etc. Some of the requirements related to the environment
in which the trailer would be used. For example, pebbles or branches can scratch
or dent a trailer and this should be prevented. One of the requirements
concerned price and another requirement concerned sustainability, the trailer
was required to be aerodynamic if possible. This aerodynamic requirement was
given no attention during the preliminary design process.
The requirements also included some regulations about the maximum
heights of truck and trailer combinations, the installation of safety guardrails and
the structure of the rear bumper [voertuigreglement, 2005]. The maximum
height of trucks and trailers is regulated to prevent damage to tunnels and
bridges. A truck and trailer combination that is too high might get stuck in a
tunnel or under a bridge causing damage to the tunnel or bridge. The safety
guardrails on the side of a trailer between the wheels and kingpin are intended to
prevent cyclists from going under the wheels of a trailer. According to current
regulation, two small beams are deemed sufficient for safety purposes.
The customer indicated that transportation companies and trailer producers
do not always live by the rules. Sometimes trailers are loaded too high, exceeding
the maximum allowable mass. There are weighing bridges to control the total
mass of the truck, trailer and load combinations and in some roads systems are
incorporated to weigh the mass of passing truck and trailer combinations.
Drivers driving too heavy trucks can be fined. Trailer producing companies
sometimes make trailers that are officially too high, for example the trailer is 4,15
m while only 4 m is allowed [voertuigreglement, 2005]. This is due to the fact
that containers for aircraft use are 3 m high so the trailer’s inside height should
be just over 3 m to transport these containers. The kingpin, the point where the
trailer is combined with the truck is at 1,15 m so the total height of a truck and
trailer combination can be 4,15 m. Before trucks and trailers are allowed on the
road they have to be certified by the Rijksdienstwegverkeer (governmental road
traffic agency). The height is checked but there are tricks that can be used like
lowering tire pressure to make the trailer slightly lower. So it seems it is possible
to get certification for a truck that will be too high when used on the road. In
some countries, for example Switzerland, regulation is very strict and controls are
128
Design of a lightweight trailer
set in place so drivers will not use trailers that are too high because they face high
fines and it is very likely that they will get caught.3
After the requirements had been established the engineers started to generate
concepts. Most of the work was done by two engineers. One engineer acted as the
project leader, she had a master’s degree in Aerospace Engineering and about 5
years of experience with designing lightweight structures. Another engineer did
the finite element modelling. He also had a master’s degree in Aerospace
Engineering followed by a two year designing course and about 7 years of
experience with designing lightweight structures. His speciality was finite
element modelling.4 CLC is a flat organization; an employee can be the project
leader for one project while participating in other projects. There is one person
who coordinates the employees and another whose main task is the acquisition of
projects, although every employee should try to obtain projects. The main design
team for the trailer consisted only of the two engineers previously described but
they consulted with other engineers when they needed their expertise. Two
engineers were regularly involved, one an expert on structural design with fibre
reinforced plastics, working in the same room as the project finite element
specialist, gave advice during the design process; and one engineer who had a lot
of experience with trailer design was regularly asked for his opinion. The
atmosphere at the department in the engineering company was open.
Liz was as project leader responsible for the planning of the project and the
communication with the customer. Hans was responsible for the finite element
models and calculations. In the beginning Hans was rather passive and wanted to
be directed. However, further on in the design process this became less the case.
Hans’ passivity at the beginning of the project was probably due to the fact that
he had other projects for which he had to do a lot of work.
The division of responsibilities and tasks was not static. What should be done
and who should do it was discussed during the process. When certain data
should be gathered or certain calculations made there was always some active
assigning of tasks. This was done almost casually as the quotes, taken from
several discussions, indicate.
Hans talking to Liz about preparing the customer for the limited
applicability of the finite element model: ‘You have to prepare the
——————————————————————————————————
3
Switzerland has a lot of long tunnels which add additional danger if a truck trailer combination
gets stuck in one, and of course it will cause serious delays while the truck and trailer
combination is extracted from the tunnel.
4
From this point on I will use the name “Liz” for the project leader and the name “Hans” for the
Finite Element Modeling engineer, “Theo” is used for the roommate who is an expert on
structural design with fibre reinforced plastics.
129
Ethical issues in engineering design
Hans asks Liz what he is responsible for: ‘You are responsible for the
strength calculations, I only calculate the stiffnesses?’
130
Design of a lightweight trailer
Traffic safety was not often mentioned by the engineers in discussions. In one
discussion on the different designs of the chassis, it was mentioned that safety
131
Ethical issues in engineering design
Figure 7.2: Truck and trailer. This is a trailer without cyclists safety guardrails
to illustrate the point that cars and cyclists can get under a trailer. Legislation
requires that between the three wheels at the back and the one in front there are
two beams to prevent cyclists and pedestrians from getting under the trailer
[picture courtesy of Piet Knapen].
Cyclists can go under the wheels of trailers when a truck turns, especially in
city traffic truck drivers sometimes overlook a cyclist when turning. The
government requires trucks to have blind spot mirrors and safety guardrails
installed. This should prevent such accidents but the blind spot mirrors are not
always correctly installed and the safety guardrails do not shield bicyclists and
pedestrians completely from the wheels. Guardrails and blind spot mirror are
added to a trailer when it is finished. It is possible to prevent cars going under
132
Design of a lightweight trailer
133
Ethical issues in engineering design
floor should not deflect more than 20 mm. This specification is commonly used
for trailer designs within the engineering company.
Torsional stiffness is a subjective requirement according to Liz. Some drivers
like a very stiff trailer because they prefer the manoeuvrability of a stiff trailer,
other drivers prefer a less stiff trailer also because they like its manoeuvrability.
There was some discussion as to whether the design problem would be
stiffness or strength dominated. By this the engineers meant that one of the
features would in the end determine thicknesses of the materials used for the
trailer. With some design problems the strength requirements are so strict that
the strength requirements will determine the thickness dimensions. In other
design problems the stiffness requirements are so strict that these dominate the
design and material thicknesses. Based on their engineering judgement, the
engineers decided that the trailer should probably be stiffness dominated.
Connected to this issue is the fact that local strength has to be calculated once
all the design details are known. Sharp corners and connections can have a large
influence on the local strength because such points can lead to stress
concentrations. A structure that is strong and stiff enough overall may still need
some reinforcement of places with stress concentrations. These reinforcements
have to be designed in the detail design. In the feasibility study and preliminary
design only the overall strength of the trailer was taken into account. Places for
which detailed strength calculations would have to be made were identified in the
preliminary design.
Load scenarios and allowable stresses or strains (stresses in metal
components and strains in composite components) were used to calculate the
material thicknesses for a stiff and strong enough design.5 Calculating allowable
strains and load scenarios both involve engineers having to make choices. If an
engineer overestimates the allowable strains or underestimates the load scenarios
then a trailer may fail during normal use.
Allowable strains
There are different kinds of allowable strains or stresses, some are meant to give
a maximum for permanent loads, others for certain peak loads. Maximum strains
are used for composites, these strains included a safety factor of 1.5 because
composites are non-homogeneous materials. During the production of
——————————————————————————————————
5
In homogenous materials like metals allowable stresses are used because stresses are
continuous through a section. In non-homogenous materials like composites the stresses differ
in the different layers. In these cases allowable strains are used because the strains are
continuous through a section. Note that stress is defined as the intensity of force that is the
force per unit area and that strain is defined as the elongation per unit length [Gere and
Timoshenko 1995, 4-5].
134
Design of a lightweight trailer
composites, especially in the steps in which the fibres are woven and combined
with the resins, flaws may be introduced that will weaken the composite.
With composites, moisture and temperature can sometimes degrade the
mechanical properties of the material over time; therefore these influences need
to be accounted for in a conversion factor. Different organisations have
formulated different allowable strains for composites using different conversion
factors. Hans had considerable experience with projects for yacht designs and
there the maximum allowable strains defined by Lloyd’s Register are used. Liz
had just finished a project in which she had used maximum strains defined by
the CLC together with the Rijkswaterstaat and a Research centre for civil
engineering in the Netherlands (CUR). In this project they used values taken
from the literature and from tests designed to define the lower boundaries of
mechanical properties of composites produced using different production
methods. A choice had to be made between the different available maximum
strains, i.e. whether to choose those detailed by the Lloyd’s Register or those
provided by the CLC, Rijkswaterstaat and CUR.
Hans: ‘Lloyd’s indicates that you can allow 0,25% strain.’
Liz: ‘0.25%? Theo said that you could allow 1,2% strain but then you
need some safety factors.’
Hans: ‘You can allow 1% strain under compression and tension. Well,
in fact you can allow a bit more under tension than under
compression but when you take the same strength for compression
then you can allow 1,0 % with a safety factor of 4 so that makes 0,25%
maximum strain.’
Liz: ‘That’s conservative because Theo got to 1,2 % with a safety factor
of 3.’
Liz had no previous experience with the Lloyd’s data. She did not know what was
accounted for in these allowable strains and what was not. She therefore
preferred to use the allowable strains from the CLC, Rijkswaterstaat and CUR. In
one of the presentations for the customer the maximum allowable strain
indicated on the slide was 0,35%.
Load scenarios
Load scenarios are necessary to help engineers calculate minimum material
thickness. Load scenarios are descriptions of what might happen, including the
forces that will be exerted on the trailer, when it is used. If the load scenarios lead
to strains higher than the allowable strains then the material thickness should be
increased or another material must be chosen. Usually there are scenarios for
normal use, for example a trailer making a turn while carrying a load of sand.
135
Ethical issues in engineering design
There are also load scenarios for strength calculations for the more extreme
situations that might occur, such as a fully loaded trailer driving too fast over a
pothole.
In this design process the load scenarios were not known. Liz had experience
with designing trailers but this was her first assignment to design a trailer
without a roof that could be loaded with sand. The engineers did not know how
the sand would behave when the trailer turned a corner. The sand might, for
example, shift and push, with its total mass behind it against the side panels. The
engineers could refer to previous projects for some load scenarios, but at the start
of the design project Liz and Hans tried to reason out what the loads would be
using educated guesses and an aerospace engineering method.
An example of an educated guess is that Liz thought that the torsional
stiffness of the trailer should be somewhat higher than that of an existing
aluminium trailer. At the time of the design period there were problems with
aluminium trailers, with the welds used to connect the side panels to the front
panel. Fractures in these structures were probably being caused by movement
and displacement of the side panels causing extreme stresses in the welds. A
more torsional stiff trailer or a more flexible connection between the front and
side panels would solve this problem.
136
Design of a lightweight trailer
tonnes and the truck 6.5 tonnes, this leaves 44 - 5.5 -6.5 = 32 tonnes for the load
to be transported.
The load scenarios changed during the design process, and the trailer and the
load scenarios appeared to be designed simultaneously. The load scenarios that
were assumed in the first finite element calculations were the following.
Load on the floor: 32 tonnes, dynamic factor 2 and safety factor 1,5 makes 32
tonnes x 3g
Load on the floor and pressure on the side panels: floor 32 tonnes x 3g plus a
hydrostatic pressure on the side panels of “density of the sand” x “the height”
xg
Turning a corner: as a trailer takes a corner the pile of sand is subjected to a
gravitational field of 32 tonnes x 3g on floor and 32 tonnes x 3g on the side
panel
Using these load scenarios, calculations were made using the finite element
model. These calculations led to surprising results: the pressure on the side
panels would lead to a 40 cm of displacement if carrying sand! Turning a corner
would lead to a displacement of 5 m in the side panels. Liz and Hans concluded
that the load scenarios were not realistic and too severe.
Hans: ‘The design problem will succeed or fail with these load
scenarios. Could we not use the same load scenarios as the customer
used when designing an aluminium trailer?’
Liz: ‘That’s the problem. They are not able to deliver load scenarios.
We will use the ones we have used in other projects.’
Hans: ‘There have been load scenarios made for other projects, but we
have to know what the customer does with his aluminium trailer. If
you want to be smart you have to change the load scenarios, otherwise
we will not get the 10% mass reduction.’
Liz: ‘But the customer cannot give me any load scenarios, not even for
the aluminium trailer they produce now.’
Hans: ‘The risk is that the customer built the aluminium trailer based
on experience. He has learnt that he can reduce the material thickness
because it doesn’t fail. This also happened in a yacht building project.
The load scenarios that we have used for our calculations are much too
severe, this will lead to extra mass in the design. We can say that the
material is necessary because we have calculated that there is a need,
but probably having used too severe load scenarios.’
Liz: ‘We could find out what our concept does in comparison with the
strength and stiffness of the existing aluminium trailer.’
137
Ethical issues in engineering design
The displacement of the floor was 34,5 mm, which was too much according to
the engineers’ self imposed requirement for a maximum of 20 mm. A discussion
was started as to whether this should be local bending of the floor or the total
displacement of the floor with regard to the initial unloaded situation. At the end
of this discussion it was decided that the safety factor of 1,5 should not be
included. The safety factor was used to get from limit to ultimate load and the
engineers seemed to change their minds about what load to use in the load
scenarios. At first the engineers calculated the displacement of the floor using
ultimate load and then they decided to use limit load. They argued that the
displacement is one of the stiffness requirements and these should always be
calculated using limit load. According to Liz and Hans a structure is allowed to
fail to a certain extent at ultimate load, so ultimate load is way too severe for a
stiffness requirement. The use of limit instead of ultimate load reduced the
displacement of the floor to 34,5 : 1,5= 23 mm (calculations were linear elastic),
which was much closer to the required maximum of 20 mm.
The safety factor, 1,5, was also removed from the load scenario for turning a
corner, but the displacement of the side panels remained more than 1 m.
Subsequently, the dynamic factor (2) was also removed from the scenario but the
displacement remained at about a meter. Liz and Hans started to doubt whether
it was realistic to assume that the complete load of sand will push against the side
panel. After the discussions the load scenarios were changed to the following.
As can be seen in the previous quote Liz and Hans also decided to make a finite
element model of the existing aluminium trailer for comparison. These above
load scenarios were used to calculate the displacements in the finite element
models of the existing aluminium trailer and for the concept composite trailer.
The load scenario turning a corner still led to extreme displacements of the side
panels, 290 mm in the aluminium trailer and 770 mm in the concept trailer. The
engineers started thinking about whether the trailer would roll over when the
138
Design of a lightweight trailer
load pushed completely against one side of a trailer. The scenario load on the
floor and pressure on the side panels led to 60 mm displacement of the side
panels in the aluminium trailer. This displacement would probably be visible
when a trailer was being loaded. A trailer might look unstable when being loaded
and turning corners because of the visible displacement of the side panels.
Looking at the results Liz and Hans concluded that the stresses in the side panels
were low enough so there was no strength problem only a stiffness problem.
To check whether the load scenarios were realistic Liz asked the customer
whether he had ever seen any displacement in the side panels of an aluminium
trailer when the trailer was fully loaded. The customer said that he saw no
displacement in the side panels of the aluminium trailer. Liz thought that this
might be due to the fact that there was no hydrostatic pressure from the sand on
the side panels. The internal friction of the sand might prevent the pile of sand
from completely sliding to the side panel. Because both Liz and Hans had no
experience with calculations concerning internal friction in a pile of sand, and the
time they had for this preliminary design was limited, the decision was made that
the side panels should have the same stiffness as the side panels of the existing
aluminium trailer. So they decided to skip the load on the floor and pressure on
the side panels scenario completely. Instead of this they calculated the stiffness of
the side panels of the existing aluminium trailer and designed the composite
trailer side panels to have similar stiffness.
The customer indicated that he had seen no displacement of the side panels
in an aluminium trailer as it turned corners. The calculation using the load
scenario given above led to 290 mm displacement in the side panels in an
aluminium trailer. If this really happened then it would be visible. Liz and Hans
decided that a load scenario where the complete load of sand pushed against the
side panel in a corner was too severe. They decided to use a load scenario used in
a previous project for turning a corner. This load scenario was used for hand
calculations.
Only two loading scenarios remained for the finite element modelling
calculations:
As described above the other scenarios were not realistic according to the
engineers. One of the scenarios was discarded as irrelevant, i.e. load on the floor
and pressure on the side panels. One of the scenarios was calculated differently,
139
Ethical issues in engineering design
i.e. turning a corner. One scenario had been changed, i.e. load on the floor. One
scenario, torsion, was not changed, but this is not really a load scenario. A load
scenario is meant to be used to describe what loads can be expected. To
determine torsional stiffness one unit torsion is placed on a model. When the two
scenarios, mentioned before, were introduced in the finite element model, the
maximum displacement of the floor was 33 mm.7 Liz and Hans reasoned that this
displacement was calculated using 2g so the displacement would only be 16,5
mm if the trailer is at rest. This was actually within the requirement of maximum
20 mm but Liz preferred a larger margin.
Hans: ‘In fact, let’s look at the relative displacements. Because I think
that that is what is important, and it is probably a lot less. This is really
the bending of the floor. You see the yellow part is not 0.’
Liz: ‘Yellow is 6.’
Hans: ‘It is 7, the displacement ranges from 7 to 33 mm so the
bending 33-7=26 divided by 2. The bending is 13 mm by 1g.’
From this quote it can be seen that Liz and Hans decided the bending over the
largest span should be less than 20 mm not the total overall displacement. The
bending over the largest span was 13 mm. The bending was therefore well within
the requirement. The stresses and strains within the materials were lower than
the allowable stresses and strains and therefore the concept composite trailer was
stiff and strong enough.
Liz and Hans had also calculated very quickly whether a heavy driver walking
through the trailer would cause the trailer to bend too much. To calculate this
they considered a mass of 200 kg on a surface of 20 cm2, this should simulate a
heavy weight driver standing on one foot. The strains in the floor were found to
be below allowable strains and the driver would not have the feeling that the floor
was saggy.
The load scenarios turning a corner and braking were calculated by hand, not
using finite element modelling.8 Load scenarios were still needed to make the
braking and turning corners calculations. Estimations of the mass and
acceleration during braking and turning a corner were necessary. The engineers
——————————————————————————————————
7
Notice that this is different from the 23 mm that the engineers attained before but the material
thicknesses had also changed. As I indicated before, material thicknesses and properties were
changed simultaneously with the load scenarios.
8
These calculations are called “hand calculations” but for most calculations a computer
program (Mathlab) is used to solve the equations. This computer program is widely used
throughout the engineering world for analytical and numerical calculations. The difference with
the finite element program is that finite element calculations are always numerical solutions,
and that, to perform such calculations a model of the product or part needs to be made. It is not
necessary to make a model when using Mathlab.
140
Design of a lightweight trailer
used results from a previous project to estimate the mass and the acceleration.
Hans had a lot of trouble reconstructing what had been done in the previous
project. There were some typing flaws in numbers of the report. This made the
reconstruction of what loads were added to which other loads very difficult, for
example the loads exerted by driving straight always seemed to be added to the
other loads such as those for braking or turning a corner. In the finite element
calculations the complete trailer was modelled and the load they used for
calculating was the load of the sand. The by hand calculations begin with the axle
loads which was 9 tonnes as defined by regulations. Acceleration figures were
taken from a report of a previous project. The engineers tried to compare the
geometry of the trailer near the axles with standard geometries used to calculate
stresses and strains. For example, the moment of inertia of a certain
configuration was calculated by using standard geometries from a handbook. In
these calculations the engineers tried to decide what the material thickness and
the orientation of the fibres in the composites should be to get the strains below
the allowable strains for composites and the stresses below allowable stresses for
the aluminium parts. The engineers discussed how far the strains should be
under the allowable strains because holes need to be drilled in some of the load
bearing structures to connect them with other parts. Such holes lead to stress or
strain concentrations that are difficult to predict in composites. The strains were
required to be well below the allowable strains to allow for the strain
concentrations round the holes.
141
Ethical issues in engineering design
Figure 7.3: sketch of trailer loaded with sand and rods open
To prevent this, three rods were inserted at the upper side between the side
panels. These rods will stay in place most of the time during use but need to be
removed before loading a trailer with long materials, once loaded the trailer rods
need to be reinserted.9 While discussing misuse of trailers, Hans asked the
customer whether the rods are always inserted. Failing to insert the rods will
compromise the stiffness of the total trailer. The side panels can move
independently. The customer answered that he had not often seen rods left out
——————————————————————————————————
9
The trailer was designed to be loaded from above and the rods are in the way when loading
long materials.
142
Design of a lightweight trailer
after loading, although he knew that some drivers transporting sugar beets
sometimes load too much and cannot reinsert the rods. According to the
customer you can see the side panels move when this happens. He also said that
his customers are informed not to use his trailers in this way. The extreme
scenario of a trailer loaded with more than 40 tonnes of sugar beets without
closed rods turning a corner while driving fast may cause the strains in the
material to exceed those that are allowed and calculated in the safety margins.
During the interviews and the discussion after my presentation some implicit
ideas about the responsibilities of the different involved stakeholders were made
explicit (see section 1.2 and 3.3). The contract terms from the TNO waive all legal
liability for the use of results from TNO research to the customer(s). Only in
cases of fraud or severe negligence can the TNO be held liable for problems
caused by the application of their research results. So persons affected by
products designed using results from the TNO cannot easily turn to the TNO for
liability claims [TNO, 2003]. In accordance with this, the customer is ascribed
the major part of the responsibility for the design process.
The customer indicated in his interview that he felt responsible for providing
all the relevant information to the engineers. This could be information about
what he wanted but also about what problems he had encountered in previous
designs. The engineers should then come up with a design according to what he
wanted. The customer said that setting and adapting requirements was his
responsibility. With regard to overloading he indicated that while testing the
prototypes he would deliberately overload the trailer to test whether accidental
and intentional overloading would cause problems. He thought of using a load
of 39 tonnes and was considering testing the trailer to failure point. He also said
that a 32 tonnes load is reasonably high for some European countries, for
example in Switzerland or Germany 32 tonnes of sand will exceed the total mass
allowed in these countries.
Basically, the engineers thought that the customer had to decide what they
should design. If the customer defined a very narrow design problem then the
engineers had to stick to this narrow description of the problem. If the
description of the design problem was widened to include more aspects, then
they would include more aspects in the design process. The engineers came up
with examples of design problems where they had looked at broader safety
concerns than only structural reliability, for example when designing composite
yachts. There a collision with another boat might cause a leak. Usually collisions
did not lead to leaks but if thinner laminates are used this might happen. For the
143
Ethical issues in engineering design
yachting case they could not research the problem or solve it within the budget
of the project. They did, however, inform the customer about this possible
problem. In the trailer case, the customer only wanted a lightweight trailer that
would not be too expensive. Since, the customer was focused on the structure,
this is what the engineers focused on. If the customer wanted a trailer that was
safe in traffic then he should have indicated this in his requirements. In this
case, traffic safety was not included in the requirements except for a short
statement that the trailer should meet legal requirements.
When asked in the interviews, the engineers told me that they would design a
trailer that was too high according to the regulations if that is what the customer
wanted. They said that as long as they thought that a design would be safe, safe
here most of the time interpreted as structurally reliable, they would do what a
customer asked them. Liz told me that she had had some doubts in another
project where they had to design a trailer that was too high according to
regulation. She was not the project manager for that project. She asked a
representative from an organisation of transport businesses in the Netherlands
whether it was common practice to design trailers higher than permitted by the
regulations. The representative told her that that was indeed done regularly.
Liz: ‘When you hear that they do that [produce trailers too high] all the
time and that it is in one way or another possible to drive with these
trailers,… well yes we designed a trailer that was 4,15 m high. But I did
not completely agree with this.’
Hans said that they usually design according to regulations. If the customer
wants a trailer that is too high, the customer has to specify this. Hans indicated
that he would go against the regulations if asked to do so by a customer as long as
he had the idea that the design was safe or structurally reliable. He also said that
whether or not to go against the regulations depended on the product being
designed. According to Hans this would not happen in airplane design because
there the plane has to fulfil FAA criteria, otherwise it cannot be flown.
A reason given by the engineers as to why the engineering company should
not be responsible for including certain issues in the requirements in addition to
what the customer wants is that they do not know what kind of problems there
are with a product. An engineering company does projects for very different
industries and products. They do not, and cannot, have in-depth knowledge of
the problems encountered with such a variety of products during, production or
in use. The customer has the experience and should know what can go wrong.
Transportation companies come to the customer when something has gone
wrong with a trailer. The customer knows how his customers (transportation
companies and drivers) used or misused his products. According to the
144
Design of a lightweight trailer
engineers, they should always ask whether a customer knows about problems
with the production or use of their products. Sometimes the CLC engineers will
have more experience with a product because of having made previous designs
for similar products. In these cases the engineers mention problems
encountered in earlier design projects. However, the customer is responsible for
the requirements and should indicate what problems might arise in use and
misuse situations. In this case-study, the customer had indicated that
overloading might occur but he never changed the requirements. The engineers
thought that changing the requirements to include overloading was the
customer’s responsibility. The engineers did not know whether overloading
caused problems for the customer. So although overloading was mentioned on
occasions, the requirements were not changed because the engineers expected
the customer to change the requirements if necessary. The customer did not
change the requirements to include overloading because he preferred to test a
prototype to breaking point.
The engineers would only incorporate the legal requirements on traffic safety in
a further phase of the design process. The customer thought that the sides
needed to be covered and that underrun protection needed to be installed. The
reasons he gave were that he thought that this would look good and that traffic
safety was a good marketing tool. Because the customer considered the side
covers to be part of the image of the trailer and not part of the structure he did
not include this in the list of requirements, nor was it part of his negotiations
with the engineers. He asked the engineers to make a reliable structure and
considered that the image of the trailer was quite another issue that he would
deal with after a structural design had been obtained.10
The engineers did not think that they were responsible for traffic safety, they
deemed themselves only responsible for designing a manoeuvrable, and in
normal use, structurally reliable trailer. They thought that the customer was
responsible for providing the relevant information on experiences from practice.
According to the engineers, the government is responsible for traffic safety and
should provide adequate regulation for traffic safety. The driver of a truck and
trailer combinations has the responsibility to drive with care. Although the
customer thought that traffic safety was important he did not require the
engineers to consider it because he saw it as something completely separate
——————————————————————————————————
10
Note that a lightweight trailer was intended and that adding covers onto a structurally reliable
trailer adds material and mass that is not used to support loads. Usually in lightweight design
engineers try to prevent the use of extra materials in places where they do not bear loads or
where there is already enough material to support the loads.
145
Ethical issues in engineering design
from the structure of the trailer. The engineers were therefore not asked to revise
their vision on who was responsible for traffic safety.
146
Design of a lightweight trailer
I studied the preliminary design and feasibility study design phase for a
lightweight composite trailer using a new unloading system. This preliminary
design was made by an engineering company for a customer. The trailer had to
be used in combination with a conventional truck, therefore it was middle level
design. The trailer would be made of composites and include a new unloading
system. Hence the normal configuration was changed and the design was to a
certain extent radical.
147
Ethical issues in engineering design
148
Design of a lightweight trailer
use. The engineers indicated that they used the finite element calculations to
check the preliminary design but, because the load scenarios were not known,
checking the design was problematic. Trying to check a design without having
proper load scenarios raises ethical questions such as: how far can engineers go
in adapting load scenarios? In the end the trailer was designed to be at least as
stiff as the existing aluminium trailer. This choice implied that the stiffness of
the existing trailer was good enough, but the engineers were not sure about this.
The question remains: What can be concluded from finite element calculations
if the load scenarios are not known? The engineers did not really seem to have a
problem with this. They would have preferred to have the load scenarios but,
because these were not available, they used educated guesses.
The engineers and the customer did not include traffic safety in the
requirements. The customer thought that traffic safety measures should be added
once the structure of the trailer was already designed. The customer considered
side-covers to be part of the image and not the structure. The engineers did not
seem to have realised that when designing a structure they influenced traffic
safety. The engineers decided where structural parts should be located and how
stiff and strong they should be. Cars crashing into a trailer can be prevented from
sliding under a trailer if the stiff and strong structural parts are located in a low
position, preferably at the same height as a car safety cage. This is also related to
crash compatibility (see chapter 4). In the Netherlands, pedestrians and cyclists
die every year because they go under the wheels of trailers, especially if a trailer
driver turns right and overlooks a cyclists standing next to them. The structure of
the trailer can be designed to protect pedestrians and cyclists from going under
the wheels if the structure parts cover the sides. The engineers considered that
the government was responsible for ensuring traffic safety. This disregarding of
traffic safety is ethically relevant. Legally it is not a problem that traffic safety was
not an issue in the preliminary design process because in the end the trailer can
be adjusted to comply with current legislation.
149
Ethical issues in engineering design
150
Design of a lightweight trailer
The engineers do not seem to know more about the regulative framework
than these rules although the framework has more elements. This is comparable
to the case of the engineers designing the bridge, described in chapter 6, using
some rules from a working conditions framework without using the complete
framework. Again it is an ethical question as to whether the engineers should
have considered the regulative framework concerning trucks and trailers.
Probably the regulative framework is not completely applicable in this (radical)
design of a composite trailer, but in completely disregarding the regulative
framework the requirements or operationalisations from the framework that
could have been used, are also disregarded. The engineers did not try to figure
out whether the regulative framework for trucks and trailers might have given
them additional useful information for this design process.
7.6 Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Ruflo and the engineers at the CLC for their co-operation.
151
8 Conclusions of the empirical study
In this chapter conclusions are drawn based on the four case-studies with regard
to the working hypotheses that were formulated in chapter 3 in this chapter.
These working hypotheses were:
1a) The kinds of ethical issues faced by engineers depend on design type
and design hierarchy.
1b) The ways in which engineers deal with these ethical issues depend on
design type and design hierarchy.
2a) In normal design processes a regulative framework is used by
engineers to account for the decisions made on ethical issues.
2b) This regulative framework fulfils all Grunwald’s requirements and is
therefore a normative framework.
The results from the cases are first summarized in section 8.1. Subsequently the
empirical data with regard to working hypothesis 1a are discussed in section 8.2.
It is argued that the empirical data only partly support this working hypothesis.
Contrary to what was expected the design hierarchy does not seem to influence
the kinds of ethical issues. These issues only depend on design type. It will be
shown that the empirical data only support a part of hypothesis 1b in section 8.3.
The way engineers deal with ethical issues depends on design type and again no
influence of design hierarchy was seen. It will also be argued that the empirical
data are in accord with working hypothesis 2a. Engineers use a regulative
framework to deal with ethical issues in normal design. They do not use
regulative frameworks in radical design. The regulative frameworks encountered
in this thesis do not fulfil Grunwald’s requirements. So working hypothesis 2b is
not confirmed by the empirical data. This will be argued in section 8.4. Until
now, I have considered the design problem formulation to be given fact in
design processes. I discuss this assumption in section 8.5 and indicate that the
design problem formulation is not completely fixed and engineers have ways to
influence the design problem formulation. This is highly relevant from an
ethical point of view because the problem definition determines the design type.
Finally, an attempt is made to generalise the results from the cases in section
8.6, this generalisation is done on empirical and conceptual grounds.
153
Ethical issues in engineering design
The results from the cases are summarised in tables 8.1 to 8.4. Short
descriptions of the ethical issues are given in the first column. The ethical issues
mentioned here were sometimes spontaneously mentioned by engineers, like
safety in the DutchEVO case. Other ethical issues like traffic safety in the trailer
case were not spontaneously mentioned but were recognised to be ethical issues
when this was pointed out to the engineers in the presentations I gave.
I have categorized the ethically relevant issues in the second column. The
categories were not defined before the empirical studies were done but came out
during the studies. Three of them can be related to actions in design processes
that can be ethically relevant, i.e. following Van de Poel: the formulation and
operationalisation of requirements and the assessment of trade-offs between
design requirements (see section 2.1). Most ethical issues were related to the
operationalisation of requirements and the making of trade-offs. In addition to
this, some problems concerning the division or ascription of responsibilities
were identified. The ethical issues could be divided into five categories. There
were two kinds of operationalisations made. Some operationalisations only
involved a choice between given options, for example the choice to work with the
regulative framework or a choice between different codes. In other cases of
operationalisations, these options were not given and a complete
operationalisation had to be made. The latter form of operationalisation is more
ill-structured. In the following, I refer to the operationalisation of requirements
by choosing between given options as “operationalisation I”; the ill-structured
kind of operationalisation is referred to as “operationalisation II”. There is a
category of ethical issues related to the making of trade-offs, plus a category of
ethical issues related to the division and ascription of responsibilities. There is
also a category of ethical issues related to the formulation of requirements. To
summarise, these five categories will be referred to as: operationalisation I,
operationalisation II, making trade-offs, division or ascription of responsibilities
and the formulation of requirements.
The approaches used to obtain arguments and make a decision concerning
the ethical issue are described in the third column. The persons involved in the
solution and decision approaches for the ethical issues are listed in the last
column.
154
Conclusions of the empirical study
155
Ethical issues in engineering design
156
Conclusions of the empirical study
157
Ethical issues in engineering design
158
Conclusions of the empirical study
The working hypothesis 1a about whether the kinds of ethical issues depend on
the design type and hierarchy will be assessed in this section. The ethical issues
in the four cases are summarised in tables 8.1 to 8.4. Based on these tables it can
be concluded that in both normal and radical design most ethical issues are of
the operationalisation I and II kind. Operationalisation I kind of ethical issues
were encountered more often than operationalisation II kind of ethical issues in
the normal design processes. From tables 8.2 and 8.3, it can be seen that in the
normal design cases, piping and equipment and the bridge, more than half of
the ethical issues were of the operationalisation I kind. Operationalisation I kind
of ethical issues were not encountered in the radical designs, lightweight car and
light open trailer. So, although ethical issues concerning the operationalisation
of requirements can be found in all design processes, there is a difference in the
nature of the operationalisation problems between normal and radical design
processes.
159
Ethical issues in engineering design
A clear relation between the kind of ethical issues and the design hierarchy
cannot be seen in these cases. Problems related to the division of responsibilities
seem to occur near the boundaries between companies, i.e. customer,
engineering and construction companies. This is more related to the design
phase of the design process than to the design hierarchy. If a design is made for
a customer then responsibilities have to be divided between the customer and
the design team in the first phase of the design process. The first phase of the
design process is the formulation of the design problem and the requirements.
In the trailer case, for example, the engineers of the design team ascribed certain
responsibilities to the customer. The customer was, according to the engineers,
responsible for including the relevant requirements and the customer accepted
this responsibility. Problems with the division of responsibilities can be
discerned in the last phase of the design process, the detailing or tender
specification phase, especially if another company has to construct the design.
Engineers mentioned in the piping and equipment case that there were
sometimes problems with the division of responsibilities for details of the
design. Some details were not specified enough or were specified in such a way
that they could not be made. Problems related to the division of responsibility
were not visible, in the bridge case but the engineers expected some problems
concerning the division of responsibilities to arise when they prepared tendering
specifications and during construction.
The overall conclusion is that the empirical evidence strongly supports part of
working hypothesis 1a. The kinds of ethical issues encountered in design
processes indeed depend on the design type. There was no relationship found
between the kind of ethical issues and the design hierarchy.
8.3 Approaches to resolve ethical issues and design type and hierarchy
There is a visible relationship between the design type and the solution and
decision approaches used to decide the ethical issues in the cases. In normal
design most operationalisations and trade-offs were made using a regulative
framework. A regulative framework was used to structure the operationalisation
of requirements, such a framework provides some of the operationalisations and
lays down minimal requirements. Other operationalisations were not completely
specified by a regulative framework but these operationalisations were limited to
a choice between given options. A regulative framework was also used to provide
a strategy for asking advice from certifying organisations. It can be seen from
tables 8.1 to 8.4 that the approach used to deal with ethical issues in normal
design was in more than half of the issues, to refer to a regulative framework, or
160
Conclusions of the empirical study
to ask advice from a certifying organisation. Thus in normal designs there were
fewer operationalisations made from scratch. The availability of a regulative
framework did not mean that all of the ethical issues could be decided on using
such a framework. Some subjects were not covered by the regulative framework.
For example, in the bridge case the prevention of misuse of the bridge was not
part of the regulative framework, while in the piping and equipment case the
regulative framework did not provide rules for establishing load and accident
scenarios. The Notified Body could give advice on load and accident scenarios
but it was not allowed to check accident scenarios. When a regulative framework
did not give guidance and rules on a subject the engineers fell back to relying on
company rules, their own design experience or seeking advice from an
organization that had a lot of experience with the subject. So in the presented
cases the regulative framework was complemented with complying to company
rules, using design experience and seeking expert advice.
Only a few references were made to regulative frameworks or ideas from the
regulative framework were rejected in the radical design cases. In these cases the
approaches for dealing with ethical issues were to rely on personal or design
experience and/or to discuss such issues with the customer.
The regulative framework pertaining to car safety was rejected in the
DutchEVO lightweight car case and in the trailer case the regulative framework
concerning trucks and trailers was only used to obtain maximum dimensions,
mass and pneumatic springs. Operationalisations of ethical issues were made
based on internal norms existing in the company designing the trailer. These
internal norms were also of help in deciding what trade-offs were deemed
acceptable by the design team. The internal norms consisted of ideas, rules and
guidelines as to what a good design is and how a design should be made. Such
internal norms are shared by a design team, but can also be shared by (the
department of) an organisation in which the design team works. In the radical
design cases, internal norms were developed based on design experience,
educational background and personal experience. In addition to these internal
norms, customer norms can be used in operationalisations and in the making of
trade-offs.
In the trailer case, a lot of discussions was devoted to what load scenarios
should be used to test the reliability of the trailer. These load scenarios were part
of the operationalisation of the reliability of the trailer, and as indicated in
chapter 7, safety was equated with reliability. The department of the engineering
company in which the engineers worked specialised in lightweight composite
design. Internal norms and ideas on good design practice existed within the
department and were based upon the department’s design experience with
161
Ethical issues in engineering design
composites and on the fact that most of the engineers had graduated in
aerospace engineering. The engineers had prior experience in designing with
composites, thus during the formulation and operationalisation of requirements
the engineers used their own experience coupled with the internal norms and
ideas on good design practice of the department. The customer had a lot of
experience with the production of trailers and with how trailers are used in
practice. The customer‘s experience was also used during the operationalisation
and formulation of requirements.
In the DutchEVO lightweight car case there were few if any shared internal
norms and ideas on good design practice when the design process started.
Internal norms and ideas on good design practice evolved as the design evolved.
In the beginning of the design process it was decided that a lightweight
sustainable car would be designed. After a while it became an internal norm
that, when choosing between different options, the mass of the car should be
taken as the decisive factor. This norm developed during the design process. It
should be noted that the engineers were working with each other for the first
time and most of the design team members had very limited design experience.
The organisation, within which the design team worked, Delft University of
Technology, consists of a number of different faculties and departments and few
if any shared internal norms exist within the university at least not at this level of
design. So the design team could not refer to such norms. It can be concluded
that in the DutchEVO lightweight car case norms on good design practice were
developed simultaneously with the design.
The first conclusion is that working hypothesis 1b is only partly supported by the
four cases. The way engineers deal with ethical issues does depend on design
type but no influence of design hierarchy on the solution and decision strategy
was seen. The second conclusion is that working hypotheses 2a is convincingly
underpinned by the empirical evidence. In the normal design cases, the
engineers referred to the regulative framework to account for most of the ethical
issues. The regulative framework, however, did not provide rules and guidelines
to account for every ethical issue. Some decisions in the normal design
processes were made based on design experience and company rules. In the
radical design cases decisions were made based on internal design team norms
and, if available, customer norms.
162
Conclusions of the empirical study
163
Ethical issues in engineering design
The design processes were organised in the normal design cases in such a way
that individual engineers were confronted with ethical issues depending on their
role in the design process. In a normal design case the ethical issues could be
decided on by an individual engineer designing a part of the product. Decisions
on ethical issues were made collectively in the radical designs. The design team
discussed the ethical issues and, although a single engineer might have prepared
the discussion, the decision was ultimately made by the design team. In the
cases where a design was made for a customer, the customer was involved in
making decisions on some of the ethical issues, while certifying organisation
could be asked for advice in normal design cases.
164
Conclusions of the empirical study
Table 8.5: Ethical issues and problems with the regulative framework.
Product Ethical issues questions Kind of issues Relation with problems of the
and problems regulative framework
Piping Assumption: designing Operationalisation I Regulative framework
and by legislation and codes of requirements available but it is not accepted
Equip- leads to safe and good by some groups for example
ment installations. installations neighbours and
environmental groups.
Which code will be used Operationalisation I Regulative framework
in this design process to of requirements pragmatically incomplete.
make a good and safe
design?
What load and accident Operationalisation Regulative framework
scenarios need to be II of safety pragmatically incomplete.
accounted for?
Deviation from code Operationalisation I Regulative framework allows
allowed? of requirements for deviation, ambiguous
regulative framework.
Inconsistencies between Making trade-offs Some inconsistency in
customer requirements, regulative framework, or
codes and standards. inconsistencies between
regulative framework and
customer requirements.
165
Ethical issues in engineering design
166
Conclusions of the empirical study
Until now, I have considered the design problem definition as something that is
not part of but preliminary to the design process. At this point I want to make
some comments on the ethical relevance of the design problem definition.1
I will first discuss why the design problem formulation is ethically relevant.
In a design problem formulation a choice is made between a normal or a radical
design and between a high level or a lower level design.2 Requirements in the
——————————————————————————————————
1
I will, however, not address the question as to whether engineers should, from a moral point
of view, refuse to design certain products. Questions regarding the moral desirability of
products are interesting but outside the scope of this thesis. These questions should be
addressed by more stakeholders than only engineers, amongst others governments, non-
governmental organizations and the public.
2
Of course the design type can change during the design process. A radical design process may
become more normal because a lot of normal parts are included or because the initial radical
167
Ethical issues in engineering design
design problem formulation can refer to the working principle and the normal
configuration and thereby imply a normal design without explicitly asking for a
normal design. The choice between radical and normal design is ethically
relevant. The design type influences the kind of ethical questions that need to be
answered and the way these are answered during the design process. A
regulative framework might be available for a normal design process, therefore
more operationalisation I kind of problems can be expected. More
operationalisation II kind of problems have to be solved in radical design. There
might be ethical reasons for choosing a radical design. For example, in the
DutchEVO lightweight car case the wish to produce a more sustainable car made
the design process a radical design. A downside of radical design is that it
usually implies a larger degree of uncertainty or ignorance than normal design.
Radical designs are probably more prone to risks and unintended effects than
normal designs [Van de Poel and Van Gorp, 2006]. This uncertainty may be a
good reason to choose for a normal design. The influence on the kind of ethical
issues the engineer must face, the possibility of better meeting ethically relevant
requirements in a radical design process, and the additional uncertainty in
radical design make the choice between radical and normal design ethically
relevant. Therefore, engineers should reflect on the design problem formulation.
If a design team formulates the design problem then the design team can
and should take into account all the moral reasons for and against normal and
radical design. The design team should establish whether there are signs, for
example in the media, that the regulative framework for the product is contested.
If such signs are visible then this provides a moral reason against using (part of)
the regulative framework and for making a more radical design. This
consideration should be weighted against the fact that a more radical design will
lead to more uncertainty and ignorance regarding the actual effects of a radical
design.
Engineers sometimes believe that if a customer has defined the design
problem they have no, or only little, influence on the formulation of the design
problem. According to this point of view, engineers are hired to make a design to
solve a certain design problem, not to reformulate the design problem. So even if
there are strong moral reasons to make a radical instead of a normal design (or
vice versa) engineers cannot change the design problem formulation. This claim
overlooks the fact that the customer is hiring the engineering company for its
knowledge and experience. The customer usually hires engineers to make a
design because he or she lacks the knowledge and experience to make the
design process turns out to be too difficult. A normal design process can become more radical
during the design process if, for example, during the design process another material is chosen
then was planned earlier.
168
Conclusions of the empirical study
design. It would be strange to hire engineers for their knowledge and experience
and then refuse to take on board any suggestions made by these engineers. So
although engineers are hired to make a design to solve a design problem
formulated by a customer this does not mean that it is impossible to change the
design problem formulation from normal to radical design or vice versa.
Engineers can discuss the design problem formulation with their customer at
the beginning of the design process or even before that during contract
negotiations between the engineering company and the customer.
First, I will use the definition of radical design (see section 2.3.1) to indicate why
existing regulative frameworks are not or only partially applicable in radical
design. I will distinguish three ways in which (parts of) the regulative
frameworks are not applicable.
(1) In some radical designs the working principle is not changed, however, the
normal configuration is changed, for example if another material is used.
Designing something in a different material commonly changes the normal
configuration because the material properties of the new material are
different. For example, the new material might be stiffer but perform less
well under fatigue loading. In some of these cases some of the concepts used
in elements of a regulative framework can loose their meaning. For example,
when a design that is usually made in homogeneous metals is now made in
composite materials some of the material properties cannot be determined in
the ways prescribed by the framework. With composite materials stresses will
vary in the different parts constituting the composite (see note 5 on page 136).
The notion “the stress in the material” as stated in regulative frameworks has
lost its meaning because the different parts of a composite will be subjected
to different stresses and speaking of “the stress in the material” thus becomes
169
Ethical issues in engineering design
170
Conclusions of the empirical study
engineers have to face when making a radical design will be more of the
operationalisation II kind than of the operationalisation I kind. There are few or
no options given by the current regulative framework as to what choices can be
made regarding operationalisations. When making trade-offs in radical design
work it is often impossible to refer to minimal requirements given in a
regulative framework. Second, because engineers cannot refer to regulative
frameworks when working on a radical design they will, in general, refer more to
internal design team norms. If there are no pre-existing norms then norms will
be developed during the design process, the design teams members will use
their education, design experience and personal experience to develop internal
design team norms.
I will now give some empirical data as to why regulative frameworks can be
expected to exist for most products and processes and, hence are available for
most normal design processes. Nothing in the definition of normal design given
in section 2.3.1 indicates that a regulative framework is necessary for a design to
be a normal design. It is possible to imagine a normal design without a
regulative framework. Examples of normal designs made without a regulative
framework can be found in history. Pressure vessels for steam engines existed
and a normal configuration and working principle were established long before a
regulative framework was formulated.4
In practice, however, it can be expected that a regulative framework exists for
most normal designs. In the European Union, the main goal of standardisation
is to ensure a free market and to remove technical barriers for trade within the
EU [European Committee, 1999]. Besides the goal of supporting a free market,
standardisation ‘promotes safety, allows interoperability of products, systems
and services, and promotes common technical understanding’ [www.cenorm.be].
The “New Approach” has been formulated in 1985 to make free trade possible
within the EU, before this specific products had to be approved. This was very
time consuming, because a consensus between different countries on every
product had to be obtained. Under the New Approach, general and goal oriented
requirements were formulated for product groups like machinery, pressure
vessels and toys [www.evd.nl].5 If products or product types comply with the
general requirements written down in EU directives, then they obtain a CE
mark. Products that have obtained a CE mark are allowed to enter the EU
——————————————————————————————————
4
The first version of a boiler code was issued in France in 1823. Regulative frameworks for
boilers were developed later in other countries, for example 1838 in the US [Burke, 1966]
5
The principles of the New Approach are not followed in sectors where there was advanced EC
regulation before the New Approach was formulated in 1985. Examples of these sectors include
pharmaceutical products, chemical products and motorized vehicles [European Committee,
1999].
171
Ethical issues in engineering design
market. The New Approach combined with the goal of a free EU market implies
that all products will have to be covered by an EU directive eventually.
There are indeed various EU directives for a broad range of products among
which:
•Machinery 98/37/EC, covers all machinery with moving parts except the
machines that are covered by separate directives
•Low voltage equipment Directive 73/23/EC, covers all equipment with a
voltage between 50 and 1000 DC and 75 and 1500 AC with some
exceptions that are covered by other directives
•Lifts 95/16/EC
•Active Implantable Medical Devices 90/385/EC
•Toys 88/378/EC
EU directives have to be implemented in national law. It is, therefore, certain
that all EU countries will have national laws implementing the above directives.
All these directives refer to harmonised EU codes. If these codes, or national
codes if these harmonised codes are not available yet, are followed in design
processes then compliance with the directive can be assumed. The European
Committee for Standardization (CEN) is responsible for formulating the
harmonised codes. CEN has committees for formulating harmonised codes on
subjects ranging from chemistry to food, consumer products, construction,
transport and packaging [www.cenorm.be/cenorm/index.htm]. These are only
the EU codes. Every EU country also has its national codes for the subjects that
are not yet implemented in EU codes. So it is reasonable to expect that EU
directives, national legislation and codes exist for many products. This means
that on empirical grounds it can be concluded that in general in normal design
some form of regulative framework is available.
The availability of a regulative framework does not have to mean that all
elements of it are used in a design process. It is not legally required that
engineers design by codes. Designs, however, have to be certified and checked
before the products can obtain a CE mark. Designing by the codes is a way to
comply with the EU directives and to obtain the CE mark. Engineering
companies are free to use other design methods but they then have to supply the
relevant Notified Body with proof of conformity to EU directives. This is more
difficult than designing by codes and is not easily done. Besides this difficulty,
engineers adhere to codes because they think that using the codes is a way to
make good and safe designs. Experience has been gained in designing according
to codes and some of the codes will have been adapted and changed over
decades. Engineers do no lightly take the decision to deflect from the codes.
172
Conclusions of the empirical study
Hypothesis 2b: the regulative framework fulfils all Grunwald’s requirements and
is therefore a normative framework, is not supported by the empirical evidence.
In this research at least three commonly used regulative frameworks, those for
the construction of bridges, of piping and equipment and for car design, did not
meet Grunwald’s requirements. Generally speaking, the following problems
may be expected in regulative frameworks.
(1) There will be a problem concerning acceptance; it is not easy to establish
whether all the affected actors accept the regulative framework.
(2) EU directives under the New Approach are formulated in a goal-oriented
manner for product groups [www.newapproach.org]. When defining
regulations for product groups instead of for specific products, it may be
necessary to be a bit vague and ambiguous. This vagueness and ambiguity
can be used to help make the directive applicable for a broad range of
products. So it is very likely that there will always be some ambiguity in
regulative frameworks based on EU directives.
(3) Regulative frameworks usually leave decisions to be made by the design
engineers and are therefore not pragmatically complete. It is impossible to
prescribe every little detail of a design even if this was the idea behind the EU
directives.
173
9 Towards warranted trust in engineers
175
Ethical issues in engineering design
Engineers should know how to use the rules and guidelines from the regulative
framework. They should know how the required calculations are made and what
the concepts mean. This requires technical knowledge and skills from the
engineers.
In requiring that engineers work according to regulative frameworks, the
engineers are not required to follow the regulative framework at all cost in all
cases. Engineers should know for which cases the regulative framework can be
used and those for which it cannot, that is, they should know the limitations of
the regulative framework. Engineers are only required to use a regulative
framework if it is applicable and adequate. I will go into requirements for
adequacy in the next section. Here I only want to indicate that engineers should
decide before using a regulative framework whether it is applicable to the case at
hand. Engineers need to know the difference between radical and normal design
to judge whether a regulative framework is applicable. In normal design a
regulative framework is usually applicable, for most radical designs it is not (see
section 8.6). The divide between radical and normal design is not clear-cut,
design can be more or less normal or radical. In cases where the design is not
completely normal design nor very radical design engineers should not use the
relevant regulative framework without carefully investigating which elements of
the framework are applicable and which elements are not.
Engineers might sometimes encounter difficulties in applying elements of a
regulative framework. If trust in engineers is to be warranted trust then
engineers have a duty to help adapt and maintain the frameworks. Being a
competent engineer with goodwill towards society includes warning the people
who trust you that the current rules and regulations can lead to problems or
176
Towards warranted trust in engineers
unwanted side effects. In trusting engineers the public expects engineers to use
their skills and experience. If you bring your car to the garage because one of the
windows is broken, you would want the car mechanics to inform you if they saw
some other problems with your car, for example worn tires. You probably would
not want them to change the tires without asking you if they should, but you
would like to be warned. In this example it also depends on what discretion and
the assignment you gave the garage. If you asked the car mechanics to
thoroughly service your car then you would expect them to check everything and
repair it, including replacing the worn tires. In a similar way, engineers are
required to use regulative frameworks and to warn the appropriate organisations
if they encounter problems. Individual engineers and design teams have the
responsibility to report problems or difficulties to whoever has formulated the
specific part of the framework. However, individual engineers and design teams
do not have the responsibility to, nor are they allowed to, change complete
regulative frameworks. For example, if an engineer encounters problems with a
code then he or she should contact the commission that has formulated the
code, he or she cannot decide to change the code. New versions of codes appear
regularly and the comments of engineers who have experience with the previous
versions are incorporated in the new versions. This means that knowing how to
use a framework is not enough: engineers also need to know how a regulative
framework is formulated and know which organisations formulate which part so
they can report their experiences to the correct authority for changes to be made
if deemed necessary by that authority.
177
Ethical issues in engineering design
178
Towards warranted trust in engineers
As said above there are also problems concerning the requirement for a
pragmatically complete and unambiguous normative framework.
The first problem is that it is not clear how “pragmatically complete” and
“unambiguous” a normative framework should be. It is impractical, if not
impossible, to prescribe every little detail in a regulative framework. The more
detailed and prescriptive a regulative framework is, the fewer situations it will
cover. It is very difficult to formulate rules that cover a range of situations and
that are not ambiguous or do not need further interpretation. This problem,
amongst others, has led some philosophers to claim that it is impossible and
undesirable to formulate universal principles in ethics. According to these
philosophers, context and situation specific features should play a role in moral
deliberation (see for example [Dancy, 2004]). Thus, formulating a regulative
framework that is really complete and unambiguous is impractical and perhaps
even impossible or undesirable.
The second problem is that a balance needs to be found between complete
and unambiguous frameworks and providing some freedom for engineers to
179
Ethical issues in engineering design
180
Towards warranted trust in engineers
The results of the case-studies indicate that engineers do not use regulative
frameworks for radical designs or that they only use some parts of a regulative
framework. Therefore, trust in engineers making radical designs cannot be
institutions-based. I return to Baier’s characterisation of trust to formulate
conditions for warranted trust in engineers making radical designs: ‘A trusts B
with valued thing C’ [Baier, 1986, 236]. In this characterisation it is not obvious
what “valued thing C” can refer to. In fact, Baier herself acknowledges that
‘[seeing trust as a three way predicate] will involve some distortion and
regimentation of some cases, where we may have to strain to discern any
definite candidate for C..’ [Baier, 1986, 236]. She uses the example that when
one is in a library one trusts other people with one’s peace and safety there
[Baier, 1986, 238]. In this example Baier considers ‘one’s peace and safety’ to be
the “valued thing C” that is entrusted to another person. In line with Baier I will
use the characterisation of trust loosely and read for “valued thing C” “things the
trusting person values”. A way to characterise trust would then be: affected
actors trust engineers making a radical design with things they value.
It is not obvious what things affected actors will value and should therefore
be protected or promoted by the engineers, nor is it obvious how engineers
should do this. If someone trusts their neighbour to take care of their house
while on holiday it is clearer what the trusting person is expecting their
neighbour to do. The neighbour should watch the house, take up the mail and
water the plants. In radical design it is not clear what valued things should be
taken care of. Not everything that people value is relevant for the radical design
process of a product. Some people value Mozart’s music, other people value
heavy metal music, but what music people value is not relevant for the design of
all products. Musical preference might be relevant in the design of a radically
new audio device but not in the radical design for a trailer. Because it is not
obvious what affected actors value with regard to a radical design of a product,
the conditions for warranted trust in engineers making radical designs appear to
be:
• the engineers should know or learn what the affected actors value
relative to the product that is being designed.
• the engineers should try, as well as they can, to take care of these valued
things in their radical design.
Some elements of the framework can often still be used in radical designs in
which only the normal configuration is changed (see section 8.6). Using the
elements of an adequate regulative framework that can still be used, can be seen
181
Ethical issues in engineering design
as a way to help engineers to take into account what the affected actors value. In
a regulative framework, rules and guidelines are given to prevent certain
problems. Perhaps these rules or guidelines cannot be used completely, but it
may be useful to know what problems have been encountered during normal
design. Some of these problems might also be relevant in the proposed radical
design. Engineers can use a regulative framework to generate ideas especially for
designs in which the radicalness of the design is only due to changes in the
normal configuration.
If the design is radical because the functionality and/or the operational
principle are different from those in the normal designs then this strategy of
looking at existing regulative frameworks for ideas as to what the affected actors
might value, and what possible problems should be prevented, will not work. If
an adequate regulative framework cannot be used to get ideas because the
operational principle and/ or functionality are different then the engineers need
to identify what the affected actors value. If engineers know what the affected
actors value, then they must have the technical competence to incorporate this in
the design of the product. Identifying what the affected actors value also requires
other competences. In the following section I make a start with developing ideas
about how engineers can know, or learn, what the affected actors might value
with regard to the design of a product.
182
Towards warranted trust in engineers
seems that CTA requires that affected actors should be involved in the design
process, examples of CTA projects include mostly large scale technology
development projects like biotechnology or the Digital City Amsterdam project
[Schot and Rip, 1997]. In such large projects it is feasible to invite actors to
participate. However, the problem remains that there is no clear overview of
what the side-effects and consequences of the new technology development will
be, and therefore it is not clear who the affected actors are going to be. So,
technology development can be broadened by inviting actors to participate but it
will remain uncertain as to which actors will be affected by a technology
development. This might mean that every actor should be represented in one
way or another in the CTA procedure. In cases where new and controversial
technologies are developed like biotechnology and nanotechnology, most of the
public debate centres around which values are at stake, given the empirical
uncertainties on what possibilities nanotechnology and biotechnology will
provide in the future. Engineers cannot know what the affected actors value with
regard to these new technologies because the possibly affected actors might not
know this themselves, in such cases there will be a lot of discussion between
groups of possibly affected actors as to what values are at stake. In these cases of
very radical design it may be necessary to use CTA or informed consent
procedures (see for example [Shrader-Frechette 2002]). I will not elaborate on
these procedures, I only want to indicate that in cases involving the development
of new technologies warranted trust in engineers may require the active
participation of society in one way or another.
In the radical design processes that I have described, some consensus might
be expected between the affected actors on what values are at stake in the design
of a product. The radical designs featured in the case-studies are radical designs
of products that already existed. There is knowledge and experience within
society on the positive and negative consequences of the product type. It is to a
certain extent clear what things, that affected actors value, are at stake in these
radical design processes, although the affected actors may prioritise them
differently. It would be impossible from a practical point of view to include
(representatives of) all the affected actors in all small scale radical design
processes such as the DutchEVO project or the trailer design project. Therefore,
I will propose a way that can be used to allow engineers to identify what affected
actors value without having to ask the affected actors actively to participate in the
design process.
183
Ethical issues in engineering design
Identifying what affected actors value with regard to the design of a product
requires a degree of moral imagination from the engineers.1 Different proposals
have been made to enhance the moral imagination of people by reading
literature or enjoying art; I will not discuss this further (for a discussion on the
importance of moral imagination and ways to develop it, see for example
[Nussbaum, 2001] and [Murdoch, 1997]). My proposal is that engineers should
use their personal experience to identify what affected actors might value. The
strength of my proposal is that engineers already use their personal experience
in radical design processes, as has been concluded for the case-studies on radical
design. The engineers have personal experience and they use it during a radical
design process, they only need to use this personal experience in a systematic
way.
The cases of radical design described in chapters 4 and 7 have shown that
decisions on ethical issues were made based on internal design team norms.
These internal norms were based upon the education that the engineers had
had, their design experience and sometimes their personal experience. Relying
solely on internal norms of the design team can lead to blind spots regarding the
values that the affected actors have, as can be seen in the trailer case. Traffic
safety was not taken into account in the structural design of the trailer. The
engineers were not used to accounting for traffic safety; they only felt
responsible for designing a safe, as in structurally reliable, light trailer. In this
trailer case, the engineers did not take their personal experience systematically
into account. The engineers did use their design experience and they called on
their education, but personal experience was only used if it was personal design
experience. Even though one of the engineers had personal experience with
driving trucks, references to personal experience outside that of engineering
design were rarely made. In the DutchEVO project, personal experience with
cars was mentioned very often. The project leader used his personal experience
as a parent to try and see what other parents would find acceptable in a
lightweight family car. In discussions on the idea of making the driver feel
vulnerable, the project leader indicated that the driver should not feel too
vulnerable because a driver would never put his or her children in the back of a
family car that gave the impression of being in a cardboard car. If engineers
design very different types of products they will not have a lot of design
experience with a particular product to use when making a radical design.
Taking the personal experience of engineers systematically into account could
——————————————————————————————————
1
See also Patricia Werhane’s book on moral imagination and management decisions. She
argues that identifying different perspectives is necessary for good management decision
making [Werhane, 1999, 66-67 and 114-115]
184
Towards warranted trust in engineers
help broaden the internal norms within a design team to include what affected
actors value.
Using personal experience can be a tool for identifying the perspectives that
other actors have and the things that affected actors value. If engineers would
think about the different social roles they have, outside their design role, then
they should be able to get ideas about what affected actors value. Engineers
might even get ideas as to what operationalisations and trade-offs other actors
will find acceptable if they would consider what they themselves deem valuable
as a parent or citizen. For example, what would I want from a car if I was driving
in it with my children on the backseats? Or what would I want the car to be like
when I’m walking or cycling on the streets and the car is driven by someone
else?
A similar idea can be found in MacIntyre’s moral philosophy.2 According to
MacIntyre people should reflect on the evaluative standards of the different
practices they participate in. MacIntyre defines practices as follows:
‘By ‘practice’ I am going to mean any coherent and complex form of
socially established cooperative human activity through which goods
internal to that form of activity are realised in the course of trying to
achieve those standards of excellence which are appropriate to, and
partially definitive of, that form of activity, with the result that human
powers to achieve excellence, and human conceptions of the ends and
goods involved are systematically extended.’[MacIntyre, 1981, 187]
185
Ethical issues in engineering design
186
Towards warranted trust in engineers
It is hoped that the results of this thesis will have an influence on the education
that engineers receive, it is certainly the case that they should have an influence.
First, engineers should be taught to understand the varieties in design
processes and the implications of this for the way in which they must deal with
ethically relevant issues. It is also important that engineers understand the
relationship between normal and radical design and incomplete knowledge. The
uncertainties and incomplete knowledge are larger in radical design. The
difference between normal and radical design could be explained in the existing
engineering ethics courses, for example during sessions where problems
regarding risks and uncertainties in engineering are discussed, or in chapters of
books where these issues could be deliberately introduced and discussed.
Second, attention should be paid in engineering education to the regulative
frameworks that exist in normal design. Engineers should learn who formulates
which parts of the regulative frameworks and what their responsibility is in this.
In the case-studies used for this research, experienced engineers did not always
know the frameworks within which they worked and did not always know to
whom problems should be reported. The engineers in the IJburg bridge case
187
Ethical issues in engineering design
admitted that it had taken them about 5 years to figure out the regulative
framework and the relationships between elements of it; also in the bridge case,
the engineers did not know the regulative framework pertaining to health and
safety at construction sites. The engineers only knew that they had to make a
health and safety plan, but they did not know for example, whether there were
limits to the mass someone is allowed to lift repeatedly on a building site. These
examples show that it is problematic to assume that engineers will learn about
regulative frameworks in design practice. Engineering students should learn the
basics of regulative frameworks: the elements they consist of, the relationships
between these elements and the responsible organisations that formulate these
elements. This does not mean that engineering students should learn the
content of all the regulative frameworks that they might encounter in their later
professional life. If engineers have a basic knowledge of regulative frameworks
then they are capable of discerning particular details of the specific regulative
frameworks they encounter in their jobs. Without such basic knowledge
engineers will have difficulty establishing what regulations pertain to their
design processes and they cannot take up their responsibility for adapting the
frameworks. The engineers need this knowledge for the public to have
warranted trust in engineers making normal designs. In my opinion there is no
need for a separate course on regulative frameworks. The general outline of
regulative frameworks could be discussed in engineering ethics courses and in
design courses. Design assignments in normal design are apt to require
engineering students to design a product and to find the relevant regulative
frameworks and use these in the design. As I experienced in doing the case-
studies, it can be difficult and time consuming to list all the relevant EU
directives, national legislation, codes and standards pertaining to a product (see
sections 5.2, 6.3 and 8.6). EU directives are often amended and commonly refer
to other EU directives. Searching for codes is difficult because codes are not
freely available. Delft University of Technology library has to pay for access to
such codes and, while the Dutch NEN codes and standards are accessible, most
of the American, German or British codes are not. So there are difficulties to be
overcome when describing a regulative framework that is relevant for a product
design but if engineering students have had to do this once during their
education then it will be easier for them to find, use and understand regulative
frameworks in their professional lives. For example, an engineer who has
knowledge about regulative frameworks can see the importance of a design
requirement to design according to a certain code, while engineers who do not
have this knowledge may not realise that if they deviate from the code that they
carry the burden of proof concerning compliance with EU directives.
188
Towards warranted trust in engineers
189
Literature
Aalstein M., ‘Brug 2007 Ontwerpverantwoording Voorontwerp’, Ingenieurs
Bureau Amsterdam april 2004
Algemeen Dagblad, March 30 2005, ‘Maastricht wil af van waaghalzen op de
brug’, AMG Rotterdam
Algemeen Dagblad, July 18 1997, ‘Barsten in de brug’, AMG, Rotterdam
Arbeidsomstandighedenbesluit version 25 Feb 2004, Sdu Uitgevers Den Haag,
2004
Baier, A. (1986). ‘Trust and Antitrust.’ Ethics 96, 231-260.
Baird, F., Moore, C.J., et al. (2000). ‘An ethnographic study of engineering at
Rolls-Royce Aerospace.’ Design Studies 21, 333-355.
Baum, R.J. (1980). Ethics and Engineering Curricula. Hastings-on-Hudson: The
Hastings Center.
Baxter, M. (1999). Product design; a practical guide to systematic methods of new
product development. Cheltenham: Thornes.
Bird, S.J. (1998). ‘The Role of Professional Societies: Codes of Conduct and their
Enforcement.’ Science and Engineering Ethics 4(3): 315-329.
Birsch, D.& Fielder, J. H. (1994). Ford Pinto case; a study in applied ethics, business,
and technology. Albany: State University of New York Press.
Bouwbesluit version 2002, Staatsblad 411 2001 and amendments Staatsblad 203,
Den Haag: Sdu Uitgevers
Bovens, M.A.P. (1998). The quest for responsibility : accountability and citizenship in
complex organisations. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Brabants Dagblad, May 25 2004, ‘Doden na instorten vertrekhal Parijs’, Den
Bosch: Wegener N.V.
Bucciarelli, L.L. (1994). Designing Engineers, Cambridge: MIT Press.
Burke, J.G. (1966). ‘Bursting boilers and the federal power.’ Technology and
Culture 7(1), 1-23
Carros, 11e jaargang, nr 6, sept/okt 2004
Cross, N. (1989). Engineering design methods, Chichester: Wiley
Cross, N. (2000). Engineering Design Methods; Strategies for Product Design, third
edition, Chichester: Wiley
Dancy, J. (2004). Ethics without principles. Oxford: Oxford University Press
Darley, J.M. (1996). ‘How Organizations Socialize Individuals into Evildoing’. In:
Messick D.M. &. Tenbrunsel A. E. (eds.)Codes of Conduct, Behavioral Research
into Business Ethics.. New York: Russel Sage Foundation, 13-44.
Davis, M. (1998). Thinking like an engineer. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
191
Ethical issues in engineering design
192
Literature
193
Ethical issues in engineering design
194
Literature
195
Ethical issues in engineering design
196
Literature
197
Samenvatting
In dit proefschrift staan ethische vragen centraal die zich voordoen in technische
ontwerpprocessen. De onderzoeksvraag is de volgende:
Wat voor ethische problemen komen er in technische ontwerpprocessen voor
en hoe gaan ingenieurs hier mee om?
Om deze vraag te beantwoorden is het noodzakelijk om in de praktijk te gaan
kijken welke ethisch problemen zich voordoen en hoe ingenieurs beslissingen
nemen over ethische aspecten en welke argumenten ze daarbij gebruiken.
Beschrijvingen van de ingenieurspraktijk die verkregen zijn in dit onderzoek
moeten een bijdrage leveren aan discussies over de morele verantwoordelijkheid
van ingenieurs.
Er is in literatuur over ontwerpprocessen nog niet echt systematisch
aandacht besteed aan ethische aspecten van ontwerpprocessen. In de
ingenieursethiek is niet veel onderzoek naar ontwerpprocessen gedaan, terwijl
toch veel ingenieurs ontwerpen. Op basis van een literatuurstudie naar de aard
van ontwerpprocessen concludeer ik in hoofdstuk 2 dat ontwerpprocessen
gezien kunnen worden als: ‘georganiseerde sociale processen waarin min of
meer slecht gestructureerde technische problemen opgelost worden’. Als
ontwerpprocessen op die manier gekarakteriseerd worden dan betekent dat, dat
men om een beschrijving te maken van een ontwerpproces niet kan volstaan
met een rationele reconstructie aan de hand van de ontwerpeisen en een
beschrijving van het uiteindelijke ontwerp. Er is onder andere informatie nodig
over de organisatie van het ontwerpteam, over de manier waarop beslissingen
genomen worden en over het ontwerpprobleem. In dit onderzoek werd deze
informatie verkregen door het doen van casestudies.
De keuze van de case-studies werd sterk bepaald door de verwachting dat er
in verschillende ontwerpprocessen verschillende ethische problemen
voorkomen. Voor het karakteriseren van ontwerpprocessen is gebruik gemaakt
van ideeën van Vicenti. Vincenti heeft de begrippen “ontwerphiërarchie” en
“ontwerptype” geïntroduceerd om ontwerpen te kunnen karakteriseren. Het
ontwerptype kan variëren van radicaal tot normaal. In een normaal ontwerp zijn
zowel het werkende principe (hoe het product functioneert) als de normale
configuratie (hoe het product eruit ziet) bekend. In een radicaal ontwerp zijn
deze niet bekend of worden de bestaande configuratie en het werkend principe
199
Ethical issues in engineering design
200
Samenvatting
De eerste case is het DutchEVO project dat uitgevoerd werd aan de TU Delft
door studenten, aio’s en stafleden. Het idee was om een duurzame lichtgewicht
stadsauto te ontwerpen van maximaal 400 kg. Hiermee wilde het DutchEVO
team laten zien wat er aan de TU Delft mogelijk was maar ook een discussie in
de maatschappij opstarten over auto’s. De belangrijkste ethische kwesties in de
DutchEVO case waren de operationalisatie van de criteria veiligheid en
duurzaamheid. De operationalisering van veiligheid zoals die gegeven wordt in
het regulatief raamwerk voor auto’s wilde het DutchEVO team niet gebruiken.
Deze operationalisering leidt tot zware en stijve auto’s die wel inzittenden
bescherming bieden maar gevaarlijk zijn voor mensen buiten de auto en veel
brandstof verbruiken. Hieraan is gerelateerd dat een lichte auto altijd de grootste
versnelling krijgt in een botsing met een zwaardere auto. Een auto van 400 kg
krijgt dus altijd de grootste versnelling, bovendien was het niet mogelijk om een
auto te ontwerpen van 400 kg en daarin allerlei gebruikelijke
veiligheidssystemen zoals Anti-lock Braking System en airbags in op te nemen.
Het ontwerpteam wilde in plaats van een zware stijve auto vol met
veiligheidssystemen een lichte auto maken die goed te manoeuvreren is maar
waar mensen zich wat kwetsbaar in zullen voelen. Volgens het ontwerpteam
gaan mensen als ze zich kwetsbaar voelen voorzichtiger en veiliger rijden. Het
201
Ethical issues in engineering design
De tweede case gaat over de ethische kwesties die spelen bij het ontwerp van
drukvaten en pijpleidingen. Deze zijn met name gerelateerd aan de veiligheid
van de (petro) chemische installatie. Het ontwerp van drukvaten en pijpleidingen
was in dit geval normaal ontwerp. In het ontwerp van installaties wordt gebruik
gemaakt van een regulatief raamwerk bestaande uit Europese en nationale
wetgeving, normen en standaarden. Bovendien moest het ontwerp gecertificeerd
worden. Ingenieurs denken dat het volgen van het regulatief raamwerk een
goede manier is om veilige installaties te ontwerpen. Toch zijn niet alle ethische
kwesties geregeld in het regulatief raamwerk. Zo zijn er geen regels voor het
opstellen van belastingscenario’s en ongevalscenario’s in het regulatief
raamwerk opgenomen. De stress engineer moet hierover beslissingen nemen.
De certificerende organisaties, waaronder Lloyd’s Register Stoomwezen, mogen
de risicoanalyse die gemaakt moet worden door het ontwerpbureau officieel niet
beoordelen. Buiten deze ethische kwesties speelt er soms nog een vraag over de
verantwoordelijkheidsverdeling tussen ontwerpbureau en constructiebedrijf.
202
Samenvatting
Sommige details worden door het ontwerpbureau niet helemaal ingevuld omdat
het constructiebedrijf tijdens de constructie wat vrijheid moet hebben in de
constructiemethode. Dit kan het ontwerpbureau er toe verleiden om de moeilijke
details maar niet in te vullen.
Volgens de geïnterviewde ingenieurs ontstaat er in Nederland mogelijk een
probleem omdat de kennis over het ontwerpen van een veilige installatie
afneemt. Ontwerpbureaus hebben in de jaren negentig ervaren ingenieurs
ontslagen. Chemische bedrijven hebben hun ingenieursafdeling gesloten.
Stoomwezen, dat tot de invoering van de Europese Richtlijn voor Drukvaten de
enige certificerende instantie was in Nederland, heeft gedurende een lange tijd
een vacaturestop gehad en op dit moment gaan daar ervaren inspecteurs met
pensioen terwijl de jongere inspecteurs nog niet genoeg ervaring hebben. Deze
situatie kan ertoe leiden dat er uiteindelijk te weinig kennis is om een veilig
ontwerp te maken.
De derde case is het constructieve voorontwerp van een brug over het
Amsterdam-Rijnkanaal. Het Ingenieursbureau van de Gemeente Amsterdam
(IBA) maakte dit voorontwerp. Het architectonische ontwerp en het pakket van
eisen waren al eerder opgesteld door de architect en door een andere
gemeentelijk dienst in samenwerking met IBA. Het was een normaal ontwerp
van een boogbrug; het werkend principe en de normale configuratie werden
gebruikt. Er speelden ethische vragen rondom de operationalisering van
veiligheid en duurzaamheid en afwegingen die gemaakt moesten worden tussen
veiligheid en architectonische vorm. Het ging bij de brug niet alleen om de
veiligheid tijdens het gebruik maar ook om de veiligheid tijdens de constructie
en het voorkomen van hinder aan schepen. Voor de veiligheid tijdens het
gebruik bestaat een regulatief raamwerk gebaseerd op het Bouwbesluit. Dit
raamwerk is uitgebreid maar niet compleet. Er is bijvoorbeeld niets opgenomen
over het voorkomen van misbruik. Mensen op de brug kunnen dingen naar
beneden gooien op schepen en omdat de bogen niet steil zijn kunnen mensen
zelfs proberen over de bogen naar boven te lopen. Over het voorkomen hiervan
zijn geen richtlijnen opgenomen in het regulatieve raamwerk. Op het moment
dat de ingenieurs in een later stadium zouden beslissen om de bogen af te
schermen met een hek, zou dat mogelijk kunnen leiden tot problemen met de
architect omdat die zijn architectonisch ontwerp aangetast ziet worden door
hekken. Een andere ethische keuze was dat er gekozen moest worden tussen de
Europese normen en de NEN normen. Het regulatief raamwerk is dus wat
ambigu. Er komt op dit moment een voorlopige versie van een nieuwe Europese
code voor bruggen uit. Deze code zal uiteindelijk de oude Nederlandse NEN
normen gaan vervangen maar gedurende een bepaalde tijd mag er een keuze
203
Ethical issues in engineering design
204
Samenvatting
Op basis van de vier cases trek ik de volgende conclusies met betrekking tot de
werkhypotheses:
- Werkhypothese 1a wordt gedeeltelijk ondersteund door de cases: Hoewel
op een heel algemeen niveau de ethische problemen in een radicaal en
een normaal ontwerp meest gezien kunnen worden als problemen
rondom operationalisatie van veiligheid of duurzaamheid, het maken van
trade-offs of het toeschrijven en verdelen van verantwoordelijkheid, is er
toch wel een verschil te zien. In de normale ontwerpen waren de meeste
operationalisatie problemen in de vorm van een keuze tussen gegeven
alternatieven. In de radicale ontwerp cases kwam deze vorm van
205
Ethical issues in engineering design
206
Samenvatting
zijn. Als alleen de normale configuratie anders wordt, bijvoorbeeld door een
ander materiaal te gebruiken, dan zijn bepaalde delen van het regulatieve
raamwerk niet toepasbaar. Als composieten gebruikt worden in plaats van
metalen dan zijn alle delen uit het regulatieve raamwerk waarin gesproken wordt
over de spanning in het materiaal niet meer toepasbaar. Als de normale
configuratie en het werkend principe anders zijn dan kunnen de meeste delen
van het raamwerk niet meer toegepast worden, hoewel het hoger gelegen doel
van het regulatief raamwerk nog wel relevant is. Een voorbeeld is het ontwerp
van automatisch geleide voertuigen.Volgens het regulatief raamwerk moet elk
voertuig een bestuurder hebben. Dit wordt vereist om zo het verkeer veilig te
maken. Veilig verkeer is nog wel relevant voor automatisch geleide voertuigen
maar het vereisen van een bestuurder is tegenstrijdig met het doel van
automatisch geleide voertuigen. Omdat in een radicaal ontwerp er minder of
helemaal niet teruggevallen kan worden op regulatieve raamwerken zullen meer
ethische beslissingen genomen worden op basis van interne ontwerpteam
normen.
207
Ethical issues in engineering design
adequaat zijn. Tot nu toe heb ik Grunwalds eisen voor een normatief raamwerk
gezien als eisen aan een adequaat raamwerk. Er zijn echter problemen met deze
eisen die het normatief raamwerk als basis voor vertrouwen in ingenieurs die
normaal ontwerpen aantasten. Grunwald zegt over de eis dat het raamwerk
geaccepteerd moet zijn, dat acceptatie breder moet zijn dan door alleen
ingenieurs: alle betrokken partijen moeten het raamwerk accepteren. Maar
betekent dit dat alle partijen actief moeten aangeven dat ze het raamwerk
accepteren of mag er vanuit gegaan worden dat een raamwerk geaccepteerd is
totdat er berichten over het tegendeel verschijnen in de media? Grunwald is hier
niet duidelijk over. Bovendien kan uit het feit dat een raamwerk geaccepteerd is
niet geconcludeerd worden dat het ook acceptabel is, dat zou een naturalistische
drogredenering zijn. Ook de eisen pragmatisch compleet en niet ambigue zijn
problematisch. Een raamwerk waarin geprobeerd wordt alles in detail voor te
schrijven laat geen ruimte voor context en situatie specifieke overwegingen en is
daardoor heel beperkt toepasbaar. Bovendien hebben ingenieurs ook wat vrijheid
nodig om professioneel en moreel te handelen. Aan de andere kant geeft een
gedetailleerd voorschrijvend raamwerk ingenieurs wel macht ten opzichte van
een klant: aan bepaalde minimum eisen moet voldaan worden anders wordt het
ontwerp niet goedgekeurd. Om de eisen vast te stellen waaraan een adequaat
regulatief raamwerk moet voldoen zodat de maatschappij gerechtvaardigd
vertrouwen kan hebben in ingenieurs die normaal ontwerpen moet nog
uitgebreid onderzoek gedaan worden.
Zoals uit dit onderzoek blijkt worden bestaande regulatieve raamwerken niet
of maar gedeeltelijk toegepast in radicaal ontwerp. Vertrouwen in ingenieurs die
radicale ontwerpen maken kan dus niet gebaseerd worden op het gebruik van
regulatieve raamwerken. Voor de voorwaarden voor gerechtvaardigd vertrouwen
in ingenieurs die radicaal ontwerpen val ik terug op de analyse die Baier gegeven
heeft. Ingenieurs moeten de zaken die mensen, die mogelijke gevolgen
ondervinden, waarderen beschermen in het ontwerp. De voorwaarden voor
gerechtvaardigd vertrouwen in ingenieurs die radicale ontwerpen maken worden
dan:
- Ingenieurs moeten weten wat de mensen die gevolgen van het te
ontwerpen product ondervinden waarderen met betrekking tot het te
ontwerpen product
- Ingenieurs moeten deze gewaardeerde zaken beschermen.
Het is onmogelijk om empirisch vast te stellen wat mensen die mogelijke
gevolgen ondervinden waarderen. In radicaal ontwerp zijn niet alle
neveneffecten bekend, dus het vaststellen van alle mensen die gevolgen
ondervinden is al niet mogelijk. Een manier voor ingenieurs om te weten te
komen wat andere mensen waardevol vinden, kan zijn om te kijken naar wat zij
208
Samenvatting
zelf waardevol vinden in andere sociale rollen die ze vervullen. Een vraag die
ingenieurs zichzelf bijvoorbeeld kunnen stellen is: “Wat zou ik belangrijk vinden
in dit ontwerp van een installatie op het moment dat deze in mijn buurt
gebouwd zou worden?”. Het gebruik van persoonlijke ervaring door ingenieurs
is geen garantie dat alle zaken die mensen waarderen ook erkend worden, maar
kan wel leiden tot een verbreding van de waarden die meegenomen worden in
het ontwerpproces. Om de kans op blinde vlekken zo klein mogelijk te maken
zouden ontwerpteams divers moeten zijn. Een ontwerpteam zou moeten
bestaan uit ingenieurs met verschillende levens en achtergronden. Op die
manier is de kans het grootst dat het ontwerpteam als geheel alle zaken die
mensen waarderen die de gevolgen ondervinden kan herkennen.
209
Appendix 1
All interview transcriptions were approved by the interviewees.
All observation notes and tapes are transcribed but these were not given to the
design teams for approval.
Chapter 4 DutchEVO
Interviews
E. van Grondelle, projectleader, Delft Unviersity of Technology, 6 June 2001
N. Gerrits, BSc student, HTS Autotechniek Arnhem, 29 May 2001
J. de Kanter, PhD student, Aerospace Engineering, Delft University of
Technology, 31 May 2001
P. van Nieuwkoop, PhD student, Aerospace Engineering, Delft University of
Technology, 31 May 2001
R. Porcelijn, Industrial designer, 7 July 2000 and 14 March 2001
M. Ribbers, BSc student, HTS Autotechniek Arnhem, 28 May 2001
N. Gerrits, BSc student, HTS Autotechniek Arnhem, 29 May 2001
R.van Rossum, MSc student, Aerospace engineering, Delft University of
Technology, 8 June 2001
A. van Schaik, PhD student, Recycling, Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Delft
University of Technology, 3 July 2001
G. Sterks, MSc student, Aerospace Engineering, Delft University of Technology,
21 February 2001
H. Welten, MSc student, Aerospace Engineering, Delft University of
Technology, 1 June 2001
Observations
Design meetings (some lasted only 30 minutes others about 2 hours)
19, 20 and 21 July 2000 design meetings throughout the day
8 August 2000, 20 September 2000, 4 October 2000, 25 January 2001
(graduation presentation and discussion G. Sterks), 21 February 2001, 14 March
2001, 28 March 2001, 29 March 2001, 11 April 2001, 25 April 2001, 2 May
2001, 9 May 2001
211
Ethical issues in engineering design
For the reconstruction of the design process before I started the observations I
relied on the DutchEVO archive.
Chapter 6 Bridge
Interviews
M. Aalstein, Design leader and Engineer Steel, IBA, 30 March 2004
J van der Elsken, Engineer Concrete, IBA, 30 March 20004
E. Hemmelder, Project Leader, IBA, 31 October 2003.
H. van Kleef, Engineer Steel, IBA, 5 April 2004.
S. Molleman, health and safety and Building Site Engineer, IBA, 29 March 2001
W. Quist, Architect, 27 April 2004
G. Wurth, Consultant Civil Constructions, IBA, 28 January 2003
Short interview by telephone with R. Dayala, IBA, 20 April 2004
212
Appendix 1
Observations
Design meetings lasted about 2 hours. The following design meetings were
observed: 3 February, 17 February, 1 March, 2 March, 15 March, 30 March and 13
April 2004
Chapter 7 Trailer
Interviews
P. de Haan, Engineer CLC, 4 June 2003
P. Knapen, Ruflor, 20 November 2003
L. Tromp, Engineer CLC, 18 March and 18 June 2003
Observations
Meetings with customer: 24 March, 7 May and 12 August 2003
Meetings without customer, these meetings lasted between 1 hour and a whole
day: 18 March, 25 March, 4 April, 8 April, 10 April, 15 April, 17 April, 25 April, 2
May and 6 May 2003
213
Appendix 2
Members of the DutchEVO design team.1
Thomas: project leader, worked 14 hours a week for DutchEVO, had a degree in
Industrial Product Design from the Artschool Den Haag, had a degree in
information technology, and an MBA in Management of Automobile Design.
He has worked for an industrial design bureau and for a large company in the
US as an advisor for styling departments in automotive industry where he
advised on design processes and the use of ICT. He has worked freelance for
over 6 years, sometimes as a car designer himself, sometimes teaching car
engineers. He is married and has two young children. He joined the DutchEVO
project at the end of 1999.
Michael: Industrial designer, he was hired to design the interior but quitted in
November 2000.
Scot: Industrial designer and cultural scientist worked a few months begin 2001
for DutchEVO on ageing of design.
Jack: Industrial designer and mechanical engineer, he worked one day a week
for the university, teaching Vision in product design at Industrial Design, Delft
University of Technology. He was an advisor and sometimes followed meetings
and gave advice. He was reluctant to take any responsibility for the DutchEVO
project.
Dave: A PhD student when the project started, his appointment changed to that
of Universitair Docent (Lecturer) aeroplane materials and design in October
1999. He had a M.Sc. in Aerospace Engineering. He supervised a lot of students
doing their master’s thesis some within DutchEVO other students outside
——————————————————————————————————
1
The names are altered.
215
Ethical issues in engineering design
DutchEVO but with overlapping subjects. He still intended to finish his PhD
project on materials for crash safety.
Charlie: Student Aerospace Engineering did his master’s thesis on the load
bearing understructure of the DutchEVO. He was supervised by Dave and Ed.
He worked on his master’s thesis until January 2001.
Josef en Jeff: Students from the HTS Autotechniek in Arnhem, did their end
project for DutchEVO. They assessed different drivelines for suitability in the
DutchEVO. They were supervised by Dave and finished their work November
2000.
George en Jill: Students from the HTS Autotechniek in Arnhem, did their end
project for DutchEVO. They made a concept design for the suspension of the
DutchEVO. They were supervised by Thomas and a professor in car dynamics,
they graduated in May 2001.
216
Appendix 2
Ryan: Industrial designer, who looked at driveline and fuel, worked for a few
months for the project and quitted October 2000. He had car racing as a hobby.
John: Student from Mechanical Engineering who did a lot of simulations for
vehicle dynamic behaviour (in July 2000 to December 2000). He did not finish
a report therefore making his results almost inaccessible to other team
members. If the results were promising he would have been allowed to do his
master’s thesis on the dynamic behaviour of the DuchtEVO with a supervising
professor and a supervisor. This did not happen and he quietly left the team after
a short presentation of his results.
Susan and Ann: Both PhD student from Applied Earth Science studying
recycling. They were not part of the design team but were (sometimes) present at
project meetings and did have some input and gave advice. They were involved
during the whole period that I have followed DutchEVO.
217
Dankwoord
En dan is het eindelijk tijd om het dankwoord te schrijven…….
Ik wil allereerst mijn promotoren Peter Kroes en Jeroen van den Hoven
bedanken voor hun begeleiding. Peter bedankt dat je me deze kans gegeven hebt
om als ingenieur zonder noemenswaardige achtergrond in de ethiek een
proefschrift in de ethiek en techniek te schrijven. Je hebt me met veel geduld
wetenschappelijk en filosofisch leren schrijven. Jeroen, jammer dat je er pas zo
laat bij bent betrokken, maar ik heb toch veel gehad aan je commentaar en
ideeën. Mijn twee dagelijks begeleiders, Henk Zandvoort en Ibo van de Poel,
zijn onmisbaar geweest. Zonder hen had ik het voor mij nieuwe vakgebied niet
eigen kunnen maken. Henk, bedankt voor al het commentaar en de steun die je
gegeven hebt. Samen met Ibo heb ik twee artikelen geschreven en daar heb ik
heel veel van geleerd. Ibo, je hebt me geholpen mijn ideeën te verbeteren en
goed te formuleren. Ik ben heel vaak je kamer binnen gelopen om een idee uit te
proberen of gewoon even te praten; bedankt dat ik dan welkom was.
Theo van Willigenburg wil ik bedanken voor alle goede ideeën die hij mij
gegeven heeft toen hij in mijn begeleidingscommissie zat.
Miranda, thank you for the correction of my thesis and for all your advice on
English writing.
Ik wil ook al mijn collega’s bij de sectie Filosofie bedanken, ze hebben mijn
promotie buiten een leerzame ook een gezellige tijd gemaakt. Sabine, je bent de
beste kamergenote die ik me kan wensen. We hebben het heel gezellig gehad en
je stond altijd klaar mij iets uit te leggen over ethiek. Verder wil ik Michiel
bedanken, omdat hij mij zo goed opgevangen heeft toen ik begon met werken en
nog de enige Aio was. Marcel, Jeroen, Lotte, Maarten en Noëmi jullie waren
geweldige collega aio’s en ik vond onze besprekingen en etentjes heel gezellig.
Verder wil ik nogmaals de mensen uit de case-studies bedanken. Het was
heel erg interessant en leuk om mee te mogen lopen met ontwerpprocessen. Ik
wil met name Jens, Elmer, Liesbeth, Peter, Piet, Erwin en Malcolm noemen;
bedankt voor jullie tijd en steun.
Mijn vrienden Joyce, Karin, Erwin, Michiel en Marjolein wil ik bedanken
voor hun steun. Rest mij nog mijn ouders en mijn tweelingzus Bouke te
bedanken, omdat ze er altijd voor me zijn. Bouke, ook bedankt voor alle boeken
en artikelen die ik via jou uit de universiteitsbibliotheek van Utrecht geleend
heb. Als laatste wil ik Thijs bedanken die letterlijk samen met mij heeft
toegewerkt naar onze promoties.
219
Curriculum Vitae
Anke van Gorp was born in Tilburg on the 24th of August 1975. From 1987 until
her graduation in 1993 she attended St Odulphus Lyceum in Tilburg. After this
she studied Materials Science and Engineering at Delft University of
Technology. She received her M.Sc in 1999 on a masters’ thesis about the
fracture toughness of aluminium metal matrix composites. After this she started
her PhD research in the department of Philosophy, Faculty of Technology, Policy
and Management at Delft University of Technology. She currently works as a
researcher at the Tilburg Institute for Law, Technology and Society at Tilburg
University.
221
Simon Stevin (1548-1620)
This series in the philosophy of technology is named after the Dutch / Flemish natural
philosopher, scientist and engineer Simon Stevin. He was an extraordinary versatile
person. He published, among other things, on arithmetic, accounting, geometry,
mechanics, hydrostatics, astronomy, theory of measurement, civil engineering, the theory
of music, and civil citizenship. He wrote the very first treatise on logic in Dutch, which he
considered to be a superior language for scientific purposes. The relation between theory
and practice is a main topic in his work. In addition to his theoretical publications, he
held a large number of patents, and was actively involved as an engineer in the building
of windmills, harbours, and fortifications for the Dutch prince Maurits. He is famous for
having constructed large sailing carriages.
Little is known about his personal life. He was probably born in 1548 in Bruges (Flanders)
and went to Leiden in 1581, where he took up his studies at the university two years later.
His work was published between 1581 and 1617. He was an early defender of the
Copernican worldview, which did not make him popular in religious circles. He died in
1620, but the exact date and the place of his burial are unknown. Philosophically he was a
pragmatic rationalist for whom every phenomenon, however mysterious, ultimately had a
scientific explanation. Hence his dictum 'Wonder is no Wonder', which he used on the
cover of several of his own books.
Simon Stevin Series in the Philosophy of Technology
Research Documents
Peter Kroes and Anthonie Meijers (eds.), Philosophy of Technical
Artifacts
Engineers have to make decisions concerning ethical issues during technological
design processes. In this thesis the kinds of ethical issues that engineers encounter
are described, together with the way engineers deal with them, with a focus on ethical
issues related to safety and sustainability. Four design processes were studied,
the design process for an ultra light car, for piping and equipment for chemical
installations, for a bridge and for a lightweight open truck trailer. A diference can be
seen between normal and radical design. During the normal design processes for the
bridge and piping and equipment for chemical installations engineers referred to
regulative frameworks to account for decisions about safety and sustainability. These
regulative frameworks give minimal requirements, (parts of) operationalisations,
rules and guidelines for use in normal design. Engineers do not, or only partly
use, the regulative frameworks in the radical design processes of an ultra light car
and a lightweight open truck trailer instead they relied on internal design team
norms for making decisions about ethical issues. Following the descriptive case-
study research, the author discusses some preliminary notions for conditions
for warranted trust in engineers making normal and making radical designs.
‘Wonder en is
gheen wonder’
Na aloop bent u van harte
welkom op de receptie.