The Earth Project
An application catered to environment lovers and those who want to lead and make sustainable life choices.
Here is a quick question
Do you know what a carbon footprint is ?
If you answered yes then you are one out of six people in India who know what a carbon footprint is. A carbon footprint for those who are the other five is the total amount of greenhouse gases (including carbon dioxide and methane) that are generated by our actions. The Earth project is an app designed to help users lower their carbon footprint.
Role
Team project for a Design thinking course in Uni
Timeline
2 weeks
Research
When the team and I first started doing background research on other businesses and their carbon calculators, we were struck by how cumbersome and imprecise each one was. The majority of them had websites with pages of material explaining what it all meant, and some of them also connected it with an app. We quickly learned about the methodology and how data-intensive carbon footprinting was. This provided a better explanation for why a simpler carbon calculator had not yet been developed.
In the discovery phase of the research we quickly understood that many people were completely unaware of a carbon footprint or what carbon emissions are.So we decided to take surveys and gather more information.Regardless we found that one out of six users did not know what a carbon footprint was and those who knew were not able to actually take actionable steps to reduce them.The major complaint was that the effort required to gather the data and then provide an outcome that could or might not be correct was not worth it. They decided to leave it at that since they believed they were already decreasing their carbon impact effectively. This was one of the main problems with comprehending and quantifying a carbon footprint.
We even roleplayed and created a storyboard to empathise better
The Problem
So what seems to be the problem?
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People will not adapt or make sustainable choices if the right information isn't present
2.Lack of an easy to use Carbon Footprint calculator that does all the work for you.
Takeaways
1.Help build awareness about Carbon Emissions and Carbon Footprint
2.Have an easy to use and non cumbersome calculator
3.Motivate users to build a sustainable lifestyle
The Design Process
Inferring from the pain points we created a user flow .
The user flow acted as a guideline for the initial sketches and wireframes. As the goals were defined the wireframes were designed to be quite simple and user friendly.
After making the adjustments required we decided to have a simple form that took your inputs and calculated your carbon footprint. Had points and awards if you were carbon emission friendly and also had a feature that would help you learn more about the lifestyle
Information Architecture- Sitemap
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Wireframes (two sections)
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Hi Fidelity Designs
The home and News page
Carbon Calculator
Carbon Calculator
Results
The Earth Project was my first team project that followed the design thinking process.During the course we learned the theory of the UX double-diamond design flow, understanding the value of every point at each phase, and why and when to use them. We also learnt about 6-3-5 brainwriting to brainstorm and stimulate creativity. By the end of the project we understood the importance of the carbon footprint as it's the only way to measure the impact of a person’s action on the environment. The project served as an accountability check for all of us.