This document reports on the results of work packages (WPs) 2.1 and 2.2 in Project 2 (Product and Service Design Methods for REES, i.e. resource efficient and effective solutions) of the Mistra REES program (www.mistrarees.se). WP 2.1 and WP 2.2 aim at documenting current use of design methods and deriving requirements for design methods, respectively. The document only covers results from the scientific literature review, while other reports to be developed will cover results, for instance, from the interview study and the design session with industry partners in the Mistra REES consortium. The results of the literature review will be a foundation for WP 2.3, which aims at developing new design methods. Note that methods here include frameworks, tools, and support for designers.

The document describes current use (i.e., “as‐is” status) of product and service design methods when designing REES, as well as requirements for product and service design methods for REES (i.e., information soon‐to‐be). Both of these are results of analysis in different phases of an early phase of design for REES. Those phases consist of requirement specification, conceptual design, and analysis and evaluation, which can be ordered temporally along the design process.

From the overall analysis, found is a lack of insights about methods for designing REES, although potentially useful methods are available. This means advancement of knowledge is insufficient for industry within the subject, which is relatively new. It may also mean the developed methods are not precisely according to the needs of companies. This shows a high potential of developing new methods in the rest of the project.

More specifically, in the requirement specification, the literature shows that potentially useful methods include QFD (Quality Function Deployment), the Taguchi method, the Kano model, and data mining, among others. In the conceptual design, numerous methods exist, and most of them were developed in an older context, where REES was not as relevant as today. Those methods include DfX methods (X denotes cost, assembly, etc.), the functional block diagram, the checklist, morphological analysis, and the Fishbone Diagram. Only a few seem to be used widely in industry today. In the analysis and evaluation, available methods include Lifecycle Simulation, Lifecycle Costing, multi‐criteria decision making, and the Analytical Hierarchy Process. Most of the methods or tools available specialise in one area. This is a problem when developing an integrated offering of products and services, because designers need to have a holistic perspective for that.

Regarding requirements for methods to be developed, the authors analysed literature as follows. In the requirement specification, requirements originating from multiple aspects and actors need to be taken into account. Since an enormous amount of data and information can be collected from products and by technologies implemented today, a huge opportunity is presented for enhancing requirement specification. Yet, there seems to be little insights to take this opportunity. In conceptual design, it is important to identify and involve relevant actors as well as their requirements according to a number of scientific reports. Especially, interaction between the relevant actors seems to be critical to be implemented. In analysis and evaluation, various pieces of earlier research works recommend different features to be implemented in methods. These features include visualization of information and information flows, graphical user interface, multiple users’ participation, and ability to handle environmental information, uncertainty and risk.