Addressing sustainability in research on distributed production: An integrated literature review

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production:
An Integrated Literature Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
DOI 10.1016/j.jclepro.2014.09.039
Addressing sustainability in research on distributed production: An integrated
literature review
Cindy Kohtala
Aalto University School of Art, Design and Architecture, Helsinki, Finland
NODUS Sustainable Design Research Group
cindy.kohtala@aalto.fi
Abstract
This paper presents an integrated literature review on how the environmental sustainability
of distributed production is studied in a variety of disciplinary sources. The notion of
distributed production suggests an alternative to mass production that differs in scale,
location and consumer-producer relationship. Understanding its environmental
implications (and thereby dematerialization potential) is regarded pertinent and timely.
Key themes in the review included how distributed production can promote product
longevity and closed material loops, as well as localizing production. New and closer ties
between producer and consumer seemed central discussions but were underdeveloped with
regard to sustainability potential. Empirical work was seen especially in research on
additive manufacturing processes, while the bulk of the studies were conceptual
explorations with little testing in the real world as yet. This affirms the emerging nature of
the topic and points to a clear need for more (and more diverse) empirical research. The
review summarizes the opportunities for greater environmental sustainability as well as
potential threats that could serve to guide and improve these novel practices today. It sets
the stage for ‘distributed production’ to be examined as its own phenomenon by proposing
how it can be characterized and suggests that a research agenda could build upon the work
initiated here.
Keywords: distributed production, environmental sustainability, fab labs, mass
customization, literature review
Abbreviations
Abbreviations used in this article:
3DP 3D-Printing
AM Additive Manufacturing
DIY Do It Yourself
EIA Environmental Impact Assessment
EOL End of Life
IE Industrial Ecology
IM Injection Moulding
LCA Life Cycle Assessment
LCI Life Cycle Inventory
MC Mass Customization

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
MCP Mass Customization and Personalization
MP Mass Production
OSAT Open Source Appropriate Technology
PSS Product-Service System
RM Rapid Manufacturing
RP Rapid Prototyping
RT Rapid Tooling
SLS Selective Laser Sintering
1. Introduction
The notion of distributed production conceptualizes a shift in consumption and production
patterns away from conventional mass production, with its long, linear supply chains,
economies of scale and centralizing tendencies. The boundary between consumers’ and
producers’ roles blurs and the intermediaries between them disappear or transform. Drivers
for such reconfigurations include benefits for producers in terms of cost or competitiveness
(Jiang et al., 2006; Piller et al., 2004). Distributed production thus includes a range of
current and emerging practices where private citizens have increased capacity to affect
what is produced, from product personalization to personal fabrication.
Such an alternative structure, even paradigm, should also have the potential to be leaner
and cleaner, mitigating or eliminating the social and environmental problems associated
with mass production. This raises the question of what knowledge currently exists on the
sustainability of distributed production and how the research community is approaching
the acquisition (and implementation) of such knowledge.
This paper presents an integrated literature review that examines what aspects of
distributed production researchers are studying when they aim to establish links to
sustainability beyond simply economic sustainability. As there is not yet a clear, agreed
understanding of “distributed production” as such, the review targeted several research
fields studying decentralized, networked alternatives to mass production.
Practices that integrate production and consumption are not new, but today they are
especially enabled by (and thereby defined by) advances in digital manufacturing
technologies and the internet (Kumar, 2007; Marsh, 2012). These activities are now
evolving and entering the mainstream, from customization and personalization to co-
production or personal fabrication of goods. Whether such a shift in production mode can
help dematerialize current consumption is uncertain; it can thus be argued that the
sustainability assessment of these practices is best done sooner than later.

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
2. Theory and background
In engineering and operations management, distributed production is often a synonym for
distributed manufacturing (Windt, 2014) and takes the perspective of production planning
for networked or “virtual” enterprises aiming for flexibility, agility and greater customer
orientation in manufacturing and mass customization (Bruccoleri et al., 2005; Leitão,
2009; Tuma, 1998). Agility is a key characteristic, as the term distributed has its roots in
computing and communications, when a more robust network that distributed nodes rather
than centralizing or decentralizing hubs or switches was developed (Baran, 1964; Windt,
2014).
It is also a term used more widely ideologically as well as epistemologically, when
discussing alternative business models and opportunities for more socially beneficial and
responsive production and consumption. The notion of “distributed economies” promotes
small-scale, flexible networks of local socio-economic actors using local resources
according to local needs, in the spirit of sustainable development (Johansson et al., 2005).
The blurring between production and consumption, another key characteristic of
distributed production, may instead be referred to as “prosumption” and the consumer a
“prosumer” (Toffler, 1980), for whom production becomes part of the consumption
process. When prosumption involves peer-to-peer networks, some researchers refer to the
practice as “commons-based peer production” (Benkler, 2006). Prosumption and peer
production have been examined from the perspectives of, for instance, markets (Xie et al.,
2008), behavioural science (Ritzer et al., 2012), consumer research (Ritzer and Jurgenson,
2010) and Marxist critique (Moore and Karatzogianni, 2009). This research has especially
focused on digital artefacts and internet-based initiatives, but distributed peer production of
tangible products is attracting increasing interest in research and practice.
In the current study, material, physical goods as the output of distributed production call
particular attention to appropriate, responsible and equitable use of materials and energy.
Moreover, the most novel activities relevant in this study are for some the most
intellectually compelling and for others potentially the most disruptive: that is, “personal
manufacturing” (Bauwens et al., 2012), “personal fabrication” or “fabbing” (Gershenfeld,
2005), “commons-based peer production of physical goods” (Troxler, 2013) or simply
“making” (Anderson, 2012; Gauntlett, 2013; Hatch, 2013). For these reasons this literature
review has selected the lens of distributed production’s environmental sustainability, not to

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
the exclusion of the social and economic dimensions but rather foregrounding the
environmental issues.
As mentioned, research in this area does not yet have a common understanding of the
phenomenon (or phenomena), and terminology, success factors, indicators, system
boundaries and units of analysis vary from field to field. A survey that aims to map the
topic of distributed production is therefore deemed valuable, especially in view of its
potential as a new and more sustainable paradigm. This enables a better understanding of
how researchers regard distributed material production in relation to a more sustainable
present or future, how environmental sustainability principles are operationalized or
theorized, and what methods and data are seen as tools to study the phenomenon.
The literature review described in this paper undertook to examine three research
questions:
• what fields, disciplines or specialists are discussing distributed production and how
they are addressing it;
• how sustainability is represented and the nature of the relationship between
environmental sustainability and distributed production; and
• what research gaps currently exist as well as what research directions are most
promising.
The results reveal the current research landscape, the main topics of concern and point to
opportunities for further research as well as improved practices. The methods by which the
review was conducted are described in the following section.
3. Methods
The choice of an integrated literature review refers to a review that describes and
synthesizes the knowledge from diverse sources (Whittemore and Knafl, 2005). It is
especially appropriate for new subjects where incorporating several theoretical domains is
seen as a strategy to developing new conceptual models, research agendas and/or
metatheories (Torraco, 2005). This is in contrast to systematic literature reviews which
generally aim for a complete compendium of the literature, especially in a mature topic and
often from the perspective of one knowledge domain. In the latter the search for peer-
reviewed journal articles is therefore often done via databases.

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
In this study an integrated review allowed for more considered selection and inclusion of
varied data sources, theoretical as well as empirical, and emphasis on portraying a complex
concept through a diverse and broad sampling frame (Whittemore and Knafl, 2005). The
objective was to target representative (rather than comprehensive) channels of research,
including both journals and conferences, that reached the most relevant audiences and
would have high potential in the researcher’s estimation to examine aspects of distributed
production and its environmental sustainability.
The study therefore first identified the target sources as well as the target keywords. The
journals were selected according to field and impact factor, the conferences according to
the field(s) represented and the conference organizers’ intention to combine research and
practice (bridging academia and commerce). This approach allowed one researcher to
better tackle the screening process and ensure rigour in the literature search stage,
especially considering the challenging lack of consensus on terminology.
The diagram in Figure 1 depicts the target journals’ scientific areas, indicating how they
were selected to represent as wide a spectrum as possible (while acknowledging that
journals and their individual published studies may be cross-disciplinary). The scientific
areas are based on a mapping of scientific communications as described in Rosvall and
Bergstrom (2011). No journal from the Life Sciences was examined, as any relevant
theories or knowledge (on e.g. consumer psychology) are likely to be incorporated into
other studies, as is the case in some design or consumer research, for instance. Design,
production, consumption and environmental studies were regarded as relevant starting
points. The full list of journals and conferences selected is found in Appendices A and B.

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
Figure 1. The journals targeted in this review and their scientific research fields.
(Eigenfactor categories are given in brackets.)
The topical scope of the literature search is depicted in Figure 2. The target was a spectrum
of distributed prosumption activities as the focus of research, where the consumer
(customer, user, prosumer or ‘maker’) is able to intervene in design and production to a
greater extent than in mass production, resulting in a tangible artefact. This increased
agency, integration or input ranges from personalized options in a mass customizing or
distributed manufacturing service to fabbing: machine-aided self-fabrication of one’s own
design, e.g. in a Fab Lab (a space equipped with small-scale digital manufacturing
equipment the individual operates herself) (Gershenfeld, 2005).
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Rapid
Prototyping
Journal
(Physics and
Chemistry)
Journal of
Cleaner Production
(Environmental
Chemistry and Microbiology)
Journal of
Industrial Ecology
(Environmental Chemistry
and Microbiology)
Journal of
Sustainable
Development
Ecological
Economics
(Economics)
Journal of
Consumer
Culture
(Sociology)
Technological
Forecasting and
Social Change
(Management
Studies)
International
Journal of
Production
Economics
(Operations
Research)
CoDesign
Design
Studies
(Robotics)
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g
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c
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c
e
s

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
Figure 2: The contents scope of this literature review (in gray). The review focused on
material products and excluded digital artefacts (as produced in ‘Web 2.0’). It took into
account digital manufacturing capabilities in production: in distributed ‘Factory 2.0’
activities (thereby excluding traditional mass manufacturing) and digitally enabled,
personal ‘Do-It-Yourself 2.0’ production (thereby excluding conventional handicraft).
Regarding sustainability, it was hypothesized that research on these activities would
address various environmental aspects. Study topics and their objectives may include less
impactful supply chains (see e.g. Huang et al., 2013), cleaner manufacturing processes
(e.g. ATKINS Project, 2007) and/or overall less material flow.
The relevant keywords for the review therefore included distributed production,
distributed manufacturing, mass customization, personalization, peer production,
prosumption, fabbing, personal fabrication and Fab Labs, but the selection process was
not restricted to these keywords, given the wide range of terminology actively used.
Instead the titles, abstracts and keywords of all full papers (and full paper itself where
necessary) were examined for relevance to the topics (i.e. synonyms and comparable
constructs, not simply keywords). The procedure aimed to capture activities and operations
as well as technologies (i.e. digital fabrication, especially additive manufacturing). With
regard to environmentally relevant issues, the assumption was that ‘sustainability’ must be
important enough that it was directly addressed in the title or abstract (by the words
Factory 2.0 Web 2.0
DIY 2.0
prosumption
digital
manufacturing
distributed
hardware
distributed
software
distributed,
personalized
distributed,
personal
digital
material
commons-
based peer
production

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
sustainability, environment or green) and not hidden within the contents of the paper. The
timeframe for the literature collection was the decade from 2002 to 2012, as before this
time there was little or no interface between these technologies and services and private
citizens.
The screening excluded editorials, commentaries, book reviews and special issue
introductions. Many studies on peer production or prosumption unsurprisingly focused on
digital artefacts (such as Wikipedia) or services such as health or tourism, which were
excluded. Despite their prevalence in additive manufacturing, studies relating to
biomedical applications, automobiles and aerospace were excluded, as being too far
removed from the realm of consumer input (i.e. prosumption). Finally, papers related to
food were deemed out of scope and those relating to housing and construction out of scale
for this review.
To ensure that all relevant papers had been identified, a keyword search using each
journal’s search function was conducted at the end of the literature search stage. The
keywords used were the same used to scan the contents of titles and abstracts as described
above (the words in italics and their variants). Moreover, these keywords were entered into
the EBSCO Academic Search Elite database and the results screened for relevance.
Finally, the reference lists of the relevant papers were examined. These procedures did not
yield any new critical sources, especially not the new subject perspectives sought (such as
economics or marketing studies). The most representative coverage possible was
considered accomplished, yielding a total of 29 papers.
In analysis, a table (or concept matrix) (Webster and Watson, 2002) served to list the key
themes and summaries for each paper in a qualitative and descriptive format, based on the
research questions. The objective was to clarify what aspects of distributed production
researchers are studying and how they proceed to examine it, as well as what seems to be
known about the topic. The table was divided into two parts. Besides general categories
such as intended audience, type of paper, method, focus and unit of analysis, and nature of
the empirics, the first part of the table summarized how each paper represented distributed
production; the user and the relationship between user/consumer and producer;
sustainability; and the relationship between the production mode and sustainability.
The second part of the table listed themes that arose from the papers themselves
inductively: the authors’ own concerns, stated implications and suggestions for future
research. It also listed the researcher’s own notions on implications and research gaps not

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
discussed by the authors, as well as remarks on, for example, the quality of the paper
1
and
the most salient links to other papers in the review. Finally, three to four keywords were
ascribed to each paper independent of its own keywords.
This tabulation resulted in (a) a taxonomy or categorical grouping of the papers according
to main study focus and audience or research area, as described in Section 4.2, and (b) a
collection of the most salient themes amongst the authors, as described in Section 4.3. A
content map (as described in Hart, 1998) was then constructed with two aims: in synthesis,
to better depict the relationships among the 29 studies, and to illustrate the current
‘landscape’ of distributed production as both a phenomenon and research subject (Figure
4). A second map outlined the environmental sustainability issues as discussed by the
authors (Figure 5). These content maps are described in Section 4.4. Sections 5 and 6 then
discuss the review’s main contributions and implications.
4. Results
The group of 29 reviewed papers is listed in Table 1. The papers are accorded an identifier
consisting of a number and its source in an abbreviation which will be used throughout this
review.
Table 1: Key to articles and source abbreviations
No.
Article
Journal/Conference
Reference
No.
Article
Journal/Conference
Reference
1
Badurdeen et
al., 2010
World Conference on
Mass Customization
and Personalization
(MCPC)
[1-MCPC]
16
Marchelli et
al., 2011
Rapid Prototyping
Journal (RPJ)
[16-RPJ]
2
Ballie and
Delamore, 2011
MCPC
[2-MCPC]
17
Medini et
al., 2011
World Conference on
Mass Customization
and Personalization
(MCPC)
[17-MCPC]
3
Black and
Eckert, 2007
MCPC
[3-MCPC]
18
Mognol et
al., 2006
RPJ
[18-RPJ]
4
Black et al.,
2010
MCPC
[4-MCPC]
19
Nielsen et
al., 2011
MCPC
[19-MCPC]
5
Chin and
Smithwick,
2010
MCPC
[5-MCPC]
20
Niinimäki,
2010
MCPC
[20-MCPC]
6
Corti et al.,
2011
MCPC
[6-MCPC]
21
Niinimäki
and Hassi,
2011
Journal of Cleaner
Production (JCP)
[21-JCP]
7
de Brito et al.,
International Journal of
[7-IJPE]
22
Pearce et
Journal of Sustainable
[22-JSD]
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1
While the perceived validity of the papers had not been a screening factor (non-peer-reviewed conference
full papers were included), this was accounted for and studies of deemed lower quality were taken less into
consideration in the analysis (Whittemore and Knafl, 2005).

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Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
2008
Production Economics
(IJPE)
al., 2010
Development (JSD)
8
Diegel et al.,
2010
Journal of Sustainable
Development (JSD)
[8-JSD]
23
Petersen et
al., 2011
MCPC
[23-MCPC]
9
Dotchev and
Yusoff, 2009
Rapid Prototyping
Journal (RPJ)
[9-RPJ]
24
Sakao et
al., 2005
MCPC
[24-MCPC]
10
Drizo and
Pegna, 2006
RPJ
[10-RPJ]
25
Souren,
2003
MCPC
[25-MCPC]
11
Fogliatto et al.,
2012
IJPE
[11-IJPE]
26
Steffen and
Gros, 2003
MCPC
[26-MCPC]
12
Fox and Li,
2012
Technological
Forecasting and Social
Change (TFSC)
[12-TFSC]
27
Telenko
and
Seepersad,
2012
RPJ
[27-RPJ]
13
Franco et al.,
2010
Journal of Cleaner
Production (JCP)
[13-JCP]
28
von der
Gracht and
Darkow,
2010
International Journal of
Production Economics
(IJPE)
[28-IJPE]
14
Letmathe, 2003
MCPC
[14-MCPC]
29
Wijekoon
and
Badurdeen,
2011
MCPC
[29-MCPC]
15
Manzini, 2009
Design Studies (DS)
[15-DS]
4.1 General summary of results
All authors of the reviewed papers were based in universities and research institutes, from
Europe, the Americas (the US, Canada and Brazil) and the Pacific region (Japan, Malaysia
and New Zealand). The vast majority of authors were based in Europe (especially
Germany, the UK and Italy).
By far the majority of authors and their intended audiences represented fields that could be
described as operations and production management, environmental management and/or
design and engineering. Several design studies incorporated sociological perspectives on
consumption and identity. Two papers aimed to also reach a policy or regional
development audience and one addressed international development. About half (15/29) of
the papers were from the Mass Customization, Personalization and Co-creation (MCPC)
conferences; five of these were linked to projects and reported on interim results. Many
seemed to be initial reports of studies that would later be turned into journal papers or
theoretical explorations serving as a platform for later empirical study. Several authors
would indeed later appear as contributors to book chapters, notably in Piller and Tseng
(2009) and Poler et al. (2012).
Three points may be distinguished regarding this collection of studies. First, it is important
to note that no authors used the term “distributed production” as such, with the exception
of Manzini (2009) [15-DS] (who referred to “distributed systems”), even as all recognized

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differences from mass production in their focus area regarding production locations,
facility and/or batch sizes, the role and integration of the consumer, and/or the
configuration of the supply chain. Preferred terms were mass customization, customization
or personalization in the majority of cases (and even art customization in one paper);
prosumer in several papers and prosumption as the main term in one study; and fabbing as
the main term in one paper.
The second factor of note is the exploratory and propositional nature of many papers.
2
There were relatively few empirical studies and dominant was a sense of model-building
and sense-making in order to better inform operational practice. In these conceptual
explorations, there was little or no real-world testing reported; existing literature or
secondary data from other studies often served as data sources. Where primary data was
gathered, it was in the form of lab experiment results (quantitative)
3
; “action research”
results
4
; surveys (qualitative and quantitative), interviews (qualitative) and a Delphi study
(qualitative and quantitative)
5
; and design experiments and other descriptive material
resulting in case-study-type accounts
6
. The tendency to present frameworks and
propositions without explaining the observations or experiences that led to them is partly
due to the large number of conference papers represented, but it is also likely due to the
novelty of the topic.
Related to this novelty is the third factor of note, the scant number of papers that actually
address distributed production and sustainability. To illustrate this ratio, the number of
relevant reviewed papers was compared to the total number of published papers in each
journal. The number of relevant conference papers, presentations and session topics that
addressed sustainability as compared to the total number was also noted and tallied. These
figures are listed in Appendices A and B.
4.2 Topical categories of the reviewed papers
This section describes the results of the first analysis and grouping stage. The three main
categories will be discussed in order of their granularity, the first category of studies
addressing the process- and technique-specifics of more environmentally friendly practices
in additive manufacturing, geared especially to production engineers. The second category
of studies, the largest group, addressed production planning and evaluation in mass
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2
i.e. papers 1, 2, 5, 6, 8, 14, 15, 17, 19, 22-25, 29
3
papers 9, 13, 16, 18, 27
4
paper 12
5
papers 7, 20, 21, 28
6
papers 3, 4, 26

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customization processes, aimed especially at engineers and designers of both products and
systems. The third category was more future-oriented and transdisciplinary, studies
examining personal fabrication (fabbing) and peer-to-peer production, aimed at various
audiences. (See Figure 3.)
Figure 3: Categorization of papers and their research topics. The Mass Customization and
Personalization category (on the left, with sub-categories) represented activities that are
nearer conventional manufacturing than peer-to-peer production. The smallest group was
the ‘Fabbing’ category describing personal fabrication and peer production activities (on
the right). Bridging these two categories are the technologies themselves, with a distinct
category of papers studying Additive Manufacturing Processes (in the middle).
4.2.1 Additive Manufacturing Processes
Six papers in this review approached sustainability in distributed production by drawing
attention to processes or materials in additive manufacturing (AM) or rapid prototyping
(RP) (Table 2). The context of this research was mainly industrial scale and the AM
systems discussed in these papers mainly for prototype or component fabrication. These
studies were nevertheless included in this review as AM technologies are increasingly
relevant to mass customization (the MCPC conferences have sessions devoted to AM) as
well as services or facilities offered in peer production (fabbing).
Franco et al. (2010) [13-JCP], Mognol et al. (2006) [18-RPJ] and Telenko and Seepersad
(2012) [27-RPJ] focused on electricity consumption and energy efficiency; Dotchev and
MASS
CUSTOMIZATION
AND
PERSONALIZATION
“FABBING”:
PERSONAL
FABRICATION
FRAMEWORKS
AND MODELS
[6-MCPC]
[14-MCPC]
[19-MCPC]
[24-MCPC]
[25-MCPC]
[29-MCPC]
PRODUCT
DESIGN
[2-MCPC]
[3-MCPC]
[4-MCPC]
[8-JSD]
[20-MCPC]
[21-JCP]
[15-DS]
[22-JSD]
[28-IJPE]
SUSTAINABILITY
OF MC
[1-MCPC]
[5-MCPC]
[23-MCPC]
OTHER
[7-IJPE]
[11-IJPE]
[12-TFSC]
[28-MCPC]
[9-RPJ]
[10-RPJ]
[13-JCP]
[16-RPJ]
[18-RPJ]
[27-RPJ]
ADDITIVE
MANUFACTURING
PROCESSES
conventional
manufacturing
peer-to-peer
production

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Yusoff (2009) [9-RPJ] and Marchelli et al. (2011) [16-RPJ] on material recycling and
optimization; and Drizo and Pegna (2006) [10-RPJ] on environmental impacts more
generally in a review article. These articles were published in the Journal of Cleaner
Production and Rapid Prototyping Journal and claim these audiences accordingly:
production engineers aiming for cleaner processes in RP or rapid manufacturing (RM).
Nearly all authors lamented the lack of research in this area: studies that would validate the
claim that AM technologies are more environmentally benign than conventional
manufacturing methods in terms of waste, energy, material use, emissions and so on. The
study described in [27-RPJ] directly compared AM with mass production (MP) by
determining the ‘crossover’ production volume at which it makes environmental sense to
produce a part using selective laser sintering (SLS) rather than conventional injection
moulding (IM): SLS was more energy efficient only with very small production volumes.
However, as SLS also allows small batches at the same cost per piece and customization of
each piece or batch to an extent that IM can never reach, one conundrum in researching the
sustainability benefits of distributed production becomes apparent: the trade-off between
high environmental impact per unit in small volumes and low impacts per unit but in mass
quantities. This also entails the challenge to identify the most sensible comparison point
and system boundaries. (Chin and Smithwick [2010] [5-MCPC] also attempt a comparison
between mass customization and mass production using secondary data, discussed in
Section 4.2.2.1.)
Three lab experiments highlighted how environmentally-oriented production planning is
often concomitant with financial savings in electricity (i.e. [18-RPJ] and [13-JCP]) or
material use (i.e. [9-RPJ]). A further study, [16-RPJ], experimented with recycled glass
powder as a new material in 3D-Printing (3DP) technology.
The final paper in this category, [10-RPJ], was a review article on environmental issues
and evaluation in AM. The authors focused particularly on health and safety, waste and
energy, highlighting the health and environmental risks due to material toxicity that have
not yet been identified (even at the time of writing this review, as confirmed in Huang et
al., 2013). Aside from toxicity during use, the authors pointed to the disposal and post-
processing stages as problematic because of the materials’ unknown properties.

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Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
Table 2: Summary of Additive Manufacturing Processes category
Sub-category
Article
How distributed
production is
represented
Sustainability: defining,
measurin g
operationalizing
Main sustainability
issue addressed
Research
field, audience
Energy
[13-JCP]
Rapid Prototyping
(RP) technologies for
prototyping: Se lective
Laser Sintering (SLS)
Theoretical optimal
process e nergy
measurement
Energy consumption
of production
optimizi ng
dimensional accuracy
Operations and
production
management
[18-RPJ]
RP technologies in
manufacturing parts:
SLS and 3D Printing
(3DP)
ISO 14000 as an
example
Reducing electricity
consumption
Operations and
production
management
[27-RPJ]
Additive
Manufacturing (AM)
technologies (SLS) in
manufacturing parts
Life Cycle Inventories
(LCI), comparing AM with
mass production
(injection moulding)
Energy consumption
of production
Operations and
production
management
Recycling
[9-RPJ]
RP technologies
(SLS) for prototyping
with potential for
manufacturing (RM)
Material management
and recycling
Cost savings, quality
assuranc e prioritized
but environmental
implications if RM
expands
Operations and
production
management
[16-RPJ]
RM technologies for
producing
objects/p arts: 3DP
Recycled glass powder
experime ntation
Recycled glass for
“sustainable future for
3DP”
Operations and
production
management
Environmental
impacts
[10-RPJ]
RP and Rapid
Tooling (RT) for
prototyping and
enabling Mass
Customization (MC)
Industrial Ecology (IE),
Environmental impact
assessment (EIA), Life
Cycle Assessment (LCA)
RP materials,
especially toxic ity
Operations and
production
management
4.2.2 Mass Customization and Personalization
The second major category, Mass Customization and Personalization, is the largest. It has
been divided into four sub-categories according to topic, audience and knowledge-building
aim as regards sustainability (Table 3).
4.2.2.1 Sustainability of mass customization
Three papers discussed how to evaluate the sustainability of mass customization versus
mass production by breaking down their stages. Chin and Smithwick (2010) [5-MCPC]
and Petersen et al. (2011) [23-MCPC] both attempted to identify which MC stages are
clearly more environmentally benign (or hold potential to be). Badurdeen et al. (2010) [1-
MCPC] focused on the post-use stage, which they regarded as under-addressed, in a
conceptual exploration on closing MC resource loops.
4.2.2.2 Frameworks and models
A sizable proportion of the papers reviewed put forth frameworks and tools for rethinking
the mass customized offering, evaluating and improving its environmental footprint, and
better understanding how to leverage MC characteristics to combined economic and

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Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
environmental advantage. The model in Medini et al. (2011) [17-MCPC] aimed to map the
MC enterprise’s interrelationships with the external environments. Corti et al. (2011) [6-
MCPC] proposed a “sustainable mass customized reference framework”, setting out the
(interdependent) steps involved in product, production system and supply chain design.
The framework in Nielsen et al. (2011) [19-MCPC] drew together eco-design principles
and modular product architectures. Sakao et al. (2005) [24-MCPC] proposed that
sustainability must be tackled earlier on in the design process if dematerialization is a goal,
describing a tool aimed to help planners focus more on “customer value”. Souren (2003)
[25-MCPC] addressed the end-of-life stage, presenting a discussion on the barriers to and
enablers of closed loop MC processes in order to re-orient MC practice towards a
“recovery economy”.
While the above frameworks involved qualitative descriptions, Wijekoon and Badurdeen
(2011) [29-MCPC] and Letmathe (2003) [14-MCPC] suggested that quantifying factors
offers managers better strategic tools for evaluation and application. In the former, the
model incorporated a wide set of performance metrics for a sustainable MC business
model. In the latter, eco-efficiency was translated into a costing method to tackle the
challenges involved in ranking or weighting environmental impacts.
In sum, all papers in this section were geared to an operations management MC audience
and all represented conceptual explorations with little or no testing reported. What was
especially salient was the producer-consumer relationship in these representations of
distributed production: these were clearly producer centric and only [24-MCPC] aimed to
bring the sustainability analysis further upstream, before the product/service idea was even
born. Closing resource loops was also a recurring concern, which will be discussed further
in Section 4.3.
4.2.2.3 Product design
Another notably consistent theme of topical focus and audience connected papers by
design researchers speaking mainly to an audience of product designers. This sub-category
is nevertheless the most heterogeneous, encompassing journal articles and conference
papers, empirical studies and propositional explorations. Distributed production for these
authors was mainly understood as the ability to personalize products via digital production,
but this was also heterogeneously explored: consumer input in these studies ranged from,
for example, providing body measurements for bespoke fashion apparel to actually making
or assembling garments themselves from kits or open source designs.

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For Diegel et al. (2010) [8-JSD], in a conceptual article, environmental sustainability is
better ensured when designers follow eco-design principles but also strive to create
“lasting objects of desire, pleasure and attachment” [emphasis added]. For these authors
additive manufacturing technologies enhance designers’ expression and thus “design
quality”, leading in turn to more pleasing products. AM is also highly suited to
customizing products according to “customer needs” (which were unspecified here). This
potentially leads to a greater attachment to the product which will therefore be used longer
and not thrown away prematurely. This is described and emphasized here as a ‘formula’,
as it was a recurring theme in this category as well as a cross-cutting theme among several
categories (see Section 4.3.1).
Black and Eckert (2007) [3-MCPC] and Black et al. (2010) [4-MCPC] also focused on the
design process, in a project description where the ultimate aim was to create fashion
apparel that is more likely to be cherished and kept. Niinimäki (2010) [20-MCPC] likewise
proposed that designers can effect person-product attachment and thereby product
longevity but paid greater attention to the sociological and socio-cognitive understanding
of this attachment (the “customer needs” that were unspecified above).
In this sense, [20-MCPC] saw beyond the technologies to the potential of the new practices
or even business models afforded when designers (also) learn to engage with the consumer
in new ways. Ballie and Delamore (2011) [2-MCPC] touted this new interaction as “co-
creation”, where “design experiences” matter as much as a well-designed garment in their
conceptual exploratory paper. Niinimäki and Hassi (2011) [21-JCP] described these novel
interactive fashion practices in more detail, discussing how the current unsustainable
fashion industry can effect changes that are both environmentally beneficial and acceptable
to consumers (according to survey results).
These design papers were thereby the most consumer oriented of all reviewed papers (and
categories). Even so they did not neglect the production side, whether this entailed
inclusion of eco-design considerations or touting the benefits of digital manufacturing
technologies in promoting product longevity. Moreover, while the term prosumer was
seldom used, the notion of new activities and business models that involve
consumers/users in radical new ways arose as significant in this category.
4.2.2.4 Other
The final group in the Mass Customization category collects four studies that addressed
other concerns or audiences than the three sub-categories above. For Steffen and Gros

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(2003) [26-MCPC], digital fabrication (of furniture) as local, distributed production was
hypothesized to support sustained employment and regional development while avoiding
transportation impacts. Fogliatto et al. (2012) [11-IJPE] presented a widely cited literature
review on mass customization, where environmental implications were presented as a
marginal but “promising” area of future research linked to “MC value”.
For de Brito et al. (2008) [7-IJPE], examining attitudes in the fashion industry,
customization was an emerging area of interest. However in this study customization and
sustainability were not explicitly linked and were simply co-existing concerns for more
sustainable supply chains. Finally, the only engineering-led study to adopt the term
“prosumption” was Fox and Li (2012) [12-TFSC], whose framework for roadmapping
material technologies was aimed especially at entrepreneurs and regional development
authorities, to better determine what technologies support “sustainable” prosumption
practices. A key issue for the authors was the localization of production and materials that
corresponds with lower transport emissions. This issue will be further addressed in Section
4.3.3.
Table 3: Summary of Mass Customization and Personalization category
Sub-category
Article
How distributed
production is
represented
Sustainability: defining,
measurin g
operationalizing
Main sustainability
issue addressed
Research field,
audience
Sustainability of
MC
[1-MCPC]
Mass
Customization (MC)
Triple Bottom Line, ‘6Rs’
approach, Sustainable
Supply Chain
Management
Product-Service
System (PSS) to
enable cl osed l oops
Operations and
production
management
[5-MCPC]
MC
Life cyc le analysis of
energy and material us e
Embodied energy
analysis in MC
compared to mass
production (MP)
Operations and
production
management
[23-MCPC]
MC
End-of-Life strategies,
eco-design, life cycle
thinking
MC sustainability
gains compared to
MP
Operations and
production
management
Frameworks a nd
models
[6-MCPC]
MC
Sustainable MC criteria
(product architecture,
manufacturing, supply
chain)
MC as route to
(environmental)
sustainability through
e.g. less waste and
inventory
Operations and
production
management,
Design and
engineering
[14-
MCPC]
MC
Eco-efficiency and eco-
effectiveness, “CML
concept”
Eco-Efficiency
through efficiency
costing
Operations and
production
management,
Environmental
management
[17-MCPC]
MC
Social, economic,
environm ental
dimensions in enterprise
assessment; stakeholder
assessment
Enterprise
interrelationships
(with society and
environm ent)
Operations and
production
management

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Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
[19-MCPC]
Mass
Customization,
Personalization and
Co-creation
(MCPC)
‘Ten Gold en Rules of
Eco-Design’
Sustainability through
modularization
Operations and
production
management,
Design and
engineering
[24-MCPC]
MC
Service Engineering tool
to ensure customer
satisfaction and in turn
dematerialization of
products
Value creation and
customization
through customer
satisfaction
Operations and
production
management,
Design and
engineering
[25-MCPC]
Mass
Customization and
Personalization
(MCP)
“Double layer closed loop
model”
Recovery and closed
loop oppo rtunities
and barriers in MCP
Operations and
production
management,
Environmental
management,
Design and
engineering
[29-MCPC]
MC
6R methodology, PSS
design a pproach es to
promote dematerialization
Modelling framework
to evaluate product
and PSS
configurations
Operations and
production
management,
Design and
engineering
Product design
(fashion)
[2-MCPC]
“Co-creation”,
“user-based too ls
for discovery,
creation, production
and sharing”
Design approaches such
as “emotionally durable
design”, “co-design”,
“open source design”
Strengthening
relationship between
fashion designer and
customer to reduce
e.g. wast e
Design and
engineering
[3-MCPC]
Personalization and
customization
through (in part)
rapid prototyping
technologies
“Considerate Design
Footprint” to assess costs
and risks inclu ding
environm ental impacts
Considering
environm ental
impacts in product
design st age
Design and
engineering
[4-MCPC]
Personalization
through (in part)
rapid prototyping
technologies
Personalized fashion to
ensure fit and comfort
and in turn ext ended use
Reducing product
replacement,
consumption via
engagement and
empathy
Design and
engineering
Product design
(textiles)
[20-MCPC]
Customizing via
digital (textile)
technologies
Product longevity via
uniqueness
Fostering product-
person attachment
Design and
engineering
Product design
(clothing and
textiles)
[21-JCP]
MC, “co-creation”,
halfway products
Business models that
focus on user satisfaction
and outcomes
Design strategies to
extend product life
span
Design and
engineering
Product design
[8-JSD]
MC with the help of
Additive
Manufacturing (AM)
MC product design and
AM manufacture to create
“objects of desire”
Product longevity via
“design quality”
Design and
engineering
Other studies
[7-IJPE]
Customized
(apparel),
personalized va lue
Sustainable supply
chains and logistics,
understanding benefits
and barriers
Industry viewpoints
where customizing is
one smal l
(competitive) aspect
Operations and
production
management
[11-IJPE]
Mass
Customization (MC)
Environmental
implications of MC: likely
to influence
“dissemination and
acceptance of M C
technologies and
methods”
Environmental and
ethical issues as
recent but marginal
focus of study in
literatur e, linked to
value dimensions
Operations and
production
management
[12-TFSC]
“Prosumption”,
customer
Prosumption as desirable
new para digm, framework
Point-of-demand
production, avoiding
Regional
development,

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
“authority” over
design a nd
production
to roadmap (sustainable)
material technologies
transportation
impacts
Design and
engineering
[26-MCPC]
MC and “art
customization”,
decentralized
production
Meeting ecological
demands via sustainable
regional development
New forms of
furniture production
bridging craft s kills
and digital
technologies
Regional
development,
Design and
engineering
4.2.3 Fabbing
The third main category in this review is that of Fabbing, personal fabrication and peer-to-
peer production employing digital fabrication equipment (Table 4). In two papers fabbing
was an explicit facilitative component in more sustainable production and consumption
patterns: in Manzini (2009) [15-DS] (as “distributed systems” of production) and Pearce et
al. (2010) [22-JSD] (referring to 3D printing technologies and Fab Labs). In both papers
fabbing or peer production was seen as a way to empower local communities and
encourage responsible use of local resources (physical and social). In this sense, both
papers (explicitly in the former, implicitly in the latter) sought to flag up the resilience that
characterizes distributed networks. This association thus connected network agility with
socio-ecological sustainability in a larger scale, in contrast to the simpler production agility
supporting socio-economic sustainability more often implied in the previous sub-
categories.
The third paper in this section, von der Gracht and Darkow (2010) [29-IJPE], addressed
“fabbing” directly but did not explicitly espouse it as a route to less environmental impact.
Rather the focus was on how (or if) fabbing will affect logistics, manufacturing and supply
chains in part of a Delphi study. Fabbing was included as an unexpected or surprising
scenario that, while unlikely, could “revolutionize production fundamentally”, especially
for “less complex consumer goods”.
Table 4: Summary of Fabbing category
Sub-category
Article
How distributed
production is
represented
Sustainability: defining,
measurin g
operationalizing
Main sustainability
issue addressed
Research
field, audience
Peer-to-peer
[15-DS]
Distributed systems,
“sustainable
distributed knowledge
economy”
Design for sustainability
that facilitates social
learning process towards
sustainable society
Agenda for design
research to promote
co-creation of
sustainable solutions
Design and
engineering
[22-JSD]
Open source 3D
printers as Open
Source Appropriate
Technology (OSAT)
Sustainable development
especially poverty
alleviati on via appropriate
technologies for local
village empowerment
Open source 3D
printers’
characteristics and
optimum f uture
development
Design and
engineering,
International
development

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Logistics
[28-IJPE]
Fabbing in small-
scale factories or at
home
Environmental
sustainability not
connected directly to
fabbing but as umbrella
concern for logistics
Fabbing as a wildcard
that may impact
logistics,
environm ental
impacts im plicit
Operations and
production
management
Section 4.2 has summarized the topical categories of the reviewed papers and especially
drawn attention to how researchers have connected the distributed production practice – its
specific characteristics as distinct from mass production – to its sustainability potential,
whether this is tied to dematerialization potential of the technologies or reduced impacts
due to localization. Moreover this potential may be embedded in the new relationship
between producer and consumer (and the nature of the consumer ‘input’), but it is mainly
the design papers that examine this relationship among consumer, producer and product
more profoundly. The following section will summarize the main umbrella themes that
emerged from the analysis.
4.3 Cross-cutting themes
Subsequent to categorization, the analysis phase aimed to identify and collate salient cross-
cutting themes that delved deeper into the research questions. These themes are listed in
Table 5 in random order. The most compelling themes are described in this section, in
terms of best representing the research material in this review but also highlighting key
assumptions that deserve further scrutiny.
Table 5: Salient concerns in reviewed papers
[1-MCPC]
[2-MCPC]
[3-MCPC]
[4-MCPC]
[5-MCPC]
[6-MCPC]
[7-IJPE]
[8-JSD]
[9-RPJ]
[10-RPJ]
[11-IJPE]
[12-TFSC]
[13-JCP]
[14-MCPC]
[15-DS]
[16-RPJ]
[17-MCPC]
[18-RPJ]
[19-MCPC]
[20-MCPC]
[21-JCP]
[22-JSD]
[23-MCPC]
[24-MCPC]
[25-MCPC]
[26-MCPC]
[27-RPJ]
[28-IJPE]
[29-MCPC]
longevity
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
co-design
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
design
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
local
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
PSS
x
x
x
end of life /
reuse /
recovery
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
open source
x
x
x
x
x
craft
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
‘developing’
countries
x
x
x
Network /
Knowledge
Society
x
x
x
time
x
x
x
x
future
x
x
x
x
x
x
x

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Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
technology
affordances
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
x
4.3.1 Product longevity
As seen in Section 4.2.2.3, a notable number of authors in this review were concerned with
extending product life spans, suggesting how to combat psychological obsolescence by
design via personalization.
7
For several other authors, the focus was less on the consumer
and more on the producer: how end-of-life (EOL) can best be tackled in the mass
customizer’s business model and how personalization both enables and problematizes
recovery.
Commonly mentioned issues were the difficulty to reuse individualized products, on the
one hand, and the ability to incorporate disassembly in modular architectures on the other
(e.g. in [6-MCPC]). [23-MCPC] discussed these enablers and barriers according to various
EOL strategies such as remanufacturing or recycling. [25-MCPC] emphasized the
importance of stronger communicative and “learning” relationships between consumer and
producer in MC.
Use intensity was a related concern in several papers: [25-MCPC] pointed out how the
sense of ownership of personalized products would problematize any product sharing or
“eco leasing” solution that could better ensure higher use intensity. [14-MCPC]
hypothesized that a product tailored to a consumer’s needs will be used more, thereby
decreasing the environmental impact “per service unit”. The notion of Product-Service
System (PSS), where the consumer is offered a function rather than a product in order to
optimize resource use (Mont, 2002), was seen by several authors as a solution to these
conundrums: a way to establish the business case for closing loops by personalizing the
customer satisfaction rather than the product. PSS was mentioned as a design strategy in
[21-JCP], as a business model where products are “value generating assets” in [1-MCPC]
and as an operational model in [29-MCPC]’s evaluative framework.
In short, the authors seemed unsure of how to intensify the use of a personalized product if
not through sharing, what exactly to customize in the product-service combination, and
how to manage issues of ownership. On the one hand, PSS-oriented strategies can also
draw attention to stakeholder relationships, novel combinations of actors to deliver
satisfaction (Vezzoli et al., 2014), which may serve to meet circular economy goals. On the
other hand, these studies remained mainly conceptual and untested; there is ample room
for more research and practical interventions to test the hypotheses the authors raised.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!
7
i.e. papers 3, 4, 8, 20, 21 and 26

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Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
Empirical evidence validating our commonly held assumption that product attachment can
have a positive effect on consumption patterns and material flow (i.e. absolute
dematerialization) would also be beneficial.
4.3.2 Co-design
As stated throughout this review, the increasing ability of a consumer to influence what is
produced is a key characteristic in the construct of distributed production. In a notable
number of papers in this review, the term ‘co-design’ was used as shorthand to describe
this interaction between consumer and producer
8
or between designers and non-designers
9
.
However, the term was largely left undefined and under-explained, which was somewhat
surprising.
This vagueness stimulated two further questions: first, what exactly is the nature of co-
design envisioned by the authors? Secondly, who is responsible for initiating, designing,
implementing and/or evaluating the co-design process in these contexts? As this is clearly
an operational issue for mass customization practitioners, i.e. the “decoupling point”, the
review article [11-IJPE] provided more detail on how the MC field regards co-design, with
research attention given especially to internet- and technology-enabled collaboration.
Nevertheless the discussion seemed somewhat limited to a collection of “customer
choices”, and a MC research strand that uses “non-conventional technologies” to co-design
with customers was described as “emerging”.
In the MCPC conference papers it was mainly implied that the producer was in charge of
co-design; likewise, in some of the design-centric papers, in [4-MCPC] and [26-MCPC],
for instance, what is offered to the consumer remains the designers’ choice. At the other
end of the scale, in contrast, [15-DS]’s conception of co-design, while abstract and
visionary, seemed to imply a greater allocation of agency among all parties.
A related and more relevant set of questions also arose from the papers’ referencing to co-
design: upon whom does the onus lie for environmental evaluation and decision-making,
and how is this addressed in the conception of ‘co-design’? Many of the conference papers
focused on cleaner production strategies designed and implemented by the producer, i.e.
the producers’ responsibility. The consumers’ input in ‘co-design’ was presented simply as
‘needs’, resulting in production of “only what truly adds value for customers” (as argued in
[1-MCPC]). In some of the design-centric papers, it was not only the designers’
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!
8
i.e. in papers 1, 6, 11, 17, 21, 26, 29
9
in papers 2, 4, 15

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Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
responsibility to make eco-design decisions during the process but also to control the
consumer’s input and therefore even the definition of ‘need’.
The authors in [1-MCPC], [17-MCPC] and [29-MCPC] attempted to take the discussion a
step further, highlighting the need to incorporate eco-conscious choices in the product
configurator or consider sustainability in the co-creation planning. This explicitly aimed
not only to inform the consumer about e.g. environmental impacts in production and/or
use, but also to allow both sustainability constraints and consumer need dictate what is
actually produced as opposed to what is merely customized. In the journal papers, [21-
JCP] described a wide range of co-design options, which in turn implied a variety of ways
producers, designers and consumers can share both environmental information and
responsible decision-making, including what is produced. In [15-DS] the whole purpose of
‘co-design’ was to co-create sustainable solutions and knowledge about them.
4.3.3 Local production
For all papers explicitly mentioning ‘local’ issues, the main sustainability benefit was
avoidance of environmental impact related to transport. For the authors of [12-TFSC],
local production was a success factor integral to the “expansion of prosumption”. In [22-
JSD], local materials and solutions to local needs, enabled by open source 3D printers,
were important in the global South, where resources, skill bases and access to global
supply chains are often limited.
However, further research on changing supply chains, for instance, would clarify if, how
and when decentralizing production reduces negative environmental impact. [5-MCPC],
for instance, pointed out that despite popular assumption, mass customization often occurs
far from the customer in practice. Moreover the logistics experts surveyed in [28-IJPE] did
not find it probable that the “decentralised production of many goods on-site in small-scale
factories” would lead to significant structural changes for the logistics industry in 2025.
4.3.4 Technology affordances
The final cross-cutting theme was a category where authors aimed to capture the ‘nature of
the process’ or what they believed to what ends a technology (or process or material) best
lent itself, a category later called ‘technology affordances’. Digital manufacturing was of
particular interest to several authors with respect to what it affords, technically and
materially, as well as environmentally.

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Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
For [12-TFSC], this was the core of their study: how material technologies promote
particular production and consumption patterns. From the design point of view, [8-JSD]
and [26-MCPC] focused on how designing for additive manufacturing differs from
designing for mass production aesthetically and structurally. For these authors, the
environmental benefits of designing and producing using AM technologies were clearly
related to emotional attachment and product longevity. For the papers solely concerned
with AM technologies, as described in Section 4.2.1, material saving was especially
emphasized as an environmentally relevant benefit, while [10-RPJ] also highlighted the
role of AM prototyping as a design tool to better ensure consumer acceptance and less
waste.
The AM-centred papers revealed other compelling implicit and explicit issues. In [13-
JCP]’s study of energy consumption, for instance, an optimal low energy density range for
SLS was identified, which further offered the possibility to eliminate the pre-heating
phase. The authors in [18-RPJ] drew attention to AM equipment design that in one case
actually reduces manufacturing time, as the software identifies the longest diagonal and
starts at that point. This led to reduced electricity consumption. In [9-RPJ], the authors
pointed out that manufacturers’ specifications for powder use are generally followed in the
industry but tend to lead to unnecessary waste. The authors did not discuss the implications
further, but one could put forward that AM equipment manufacturers themselves could
pursue research and development of technologies that enable their users to operationalize
more environmentally responsible practices.
4.4 Synthesis
To further synthesize the findings discussed in the previous sections, a concept map (Hart,
1998) was created (Figure 4). It is important to note that the map is proposed as a tool for
locating current and emerging distributed production activities and research, where the
quadrants are not viewed as having clear borders but rather as a continuum. Further
research can serve to validate the axes chosen or evolve them as circumstances change.
4.4.1 The distributed production landscape
The two extremes of the construct ‘distributed production’ most discussed in the literature,
and most visible in current real-life activities, were placed in the bottom left and top right
quadrants (Figure 4). As a reminder that distributed production activities are both
commercial and conducted for non-economic reasons, the labels ‘market influence’ and
‘non-market influence’ were inserted at the two extremes. At bottom left, therefore,
representing activities nearest the current dominant mass production paradigm, ‘mass

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
customization’ at its extreme aims to retain control over consumer input (i.e. the producer
retains the final decision on what is personalized and how, likely for cost and market
reasons). Personalization is therefore ‘batch’ and modular rather than unique and volumes
are relatively large. The papers in this review discussing mass customization were placed
in this quadrant.
Figure 4: Conceptualizing the distributed production landscape.
At top right, in ‘personal fabrication’ an individual produces her own artefacts (e.g. in a
Fab Lab or ‘maker space’). She has full agency and authority over both design and
fabrication, which depends only on her own competence. Scales are small: facilities,
volumes and equipment. It is assumed the authors in the Delphi study, [28-IJPE], had this
conception of ‘fabbing’ in mind and aimed to elicit from the experts how likely this would
spread, e.g. shift towards the bottom right quadrant.
The top left and bottom right quadrants were less obviously represented in the reviewed
literature and, to the researcher’s knowledge, see less representation in real-life activities.
They have therefore been accorded working titles and descriptions based on their positions
on the axes. In the bottom right, we must imagine personal fabrication on a larger scale
(‘mass fabrication’), likely the material version of Web 2.0 peer content development and
sharing visible today. The emphasis remains on the individual’s authority over what is
mass fabrication:
unique products,
design and fabrication
in hands of users in
interaction with
each other
mass customization:
batch/modular
personalized products,
design and fabrication
in hands of producer
bespoke fabrication:
tailored, individualized
products, design and
fabrication in hands of
producer
[12-TFSC]
[7-IJPE]
[21-JCP]
[8-JSD]
[28-IJPE]
[22-JSD]
[15-DS]
[MCPC CONFERENCE PAPERS]
[11-IJPE]
personal fabrication:
unique products,
design and fabrication
in hands of user,
shared designs
market
influence
non-market
influence
WHAT IS
DISTRIBUTED
PRODUCTION?
control over user/consumer input
scale
large
small
digital
manufacturing
peer-to-peer
production

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
designed and made (i.e. a truly peer-to-peer arrangement). This accords with the
conceptions of distributed production proposed in [15-DS] and [22-JSD], and, given the
variability in consumer input in the design services described in [21-JCP], it is placed in
the middle of the scale.
In the top left quadrant, the scale is ‘small’ and therefore the level of personalization can
result in one-offs and bespoke services. Nevertheless the producer retains authority over
what is produced and what consumer input is needed. This conception of ‘bespoke
fabrication’ is influenced by the vision of prosumption presented in [12-TFSC], and the
authors’ conception of “neo-craft” “technofacture” proposed in [25-MCPC] may also be
placed here.
4.4.2 The environmental sustainability of distributed production
The final synthesis task returned to the question of how the authors see the relationship
between distributed production and environmental impact, superimposing the opportunities
onto the previous ‘landscape’ (Figure 5). Beginning in the ‘mass customization’ quadrant,
the authors reviewed saw the main environmental benefits as the capacity to avoid the pre-
consumer waste seen in mass production (especially in the fashion and clothing industry),
to enable recovery and create closed-loop systems, and to incorporate sustainability-led
parameters in the product configurators. They also saw these benefits as conditional upon
the ability to exploit the stronger consumer-producer relationships and modularity in MC
models.
In comparison, the authors envisioning a more ‘bespoke fabrication’ construct tended to
emphasize how ‘small’ means ‘local’ and therefore fewer emissions and impacts from
transport. Bespoke products were also assumed to entail less overall material and energy
use as they would be used longer and/or more intensively and be less vulnerable to
mechanisms of technical, aesthetic, functional and/or psychological obsolescence.
However, many authors highlighted the need for high quality to ensure pleasurable
associations and therefore attachment as well as functional longevity.

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
Figure 5: Opportunities to promote environmental sustainability in distributed production:
summary of the authors’ propositions.
In ‘personal fabrication’ in the top right, authors also emphasized the benefits of localizing
both production and materials. Research in rapid prototyping confirms that a fabbed
artefact may have relatively high environmental impacts per unit, but at this personal scale
overall volumes remain very low. When the scale is increased in the ‘mass fabrication’
construct, in the bottom right, we imagine that supply chains may be transformed and
movement of materials and components more prevalent than finished consumer products
(as suggested in [28-IJPE]). Some authors (especially [5-MCPC]) highlighted the
embodied energy in retail and other infrastructure that would not be expended in these
changed distribution arrangements. With regard to how consumer involvement can
influence the environmental impact of peer production (i.e. the horizontal axis), the papers
reviewed rather abstractly referred to the indirect environmental benefits of knowledge and
capacity building.
mass fabrication:
transformed supply
chains, elimination of
embodied energy of
redundant
intermediaries
mass customization:
less pre-consumer waste,
greater potential for
re-manufacturing,
“eco-guiding” configurators
for consumers
bespoke fabrication:
localized production
and lower transport
emissions, less
product replacement
personal fabrication:
localized production,
higher environmental
impact per unit but
overall lower volumes
(than MP and MC)
ENVIRONMENTAL
BENEFITS
exploit user/consumer input
exploit
scale
exploit
modularization
exploit small
and local
ensure quality for
attachment, satisfaction
exploit learning
opportunities

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
5. Discussion
Discussing the implications of this study must take into account the two objectives of the
review. The first is to map the landscape of research, i.e. who is discussing distributed
production and who is not (research questions 1 and 3), and the second, its contents: if
distributed production can enable the dematerialization of consumption (research question
2).
5.1 Hypotheses on environmental benefits
The first contribution of this paper is the summary of distributed production as seen in
Figures 4 and 5: what distributed production entails, and why and how these activities are
seen to lead to more sustainable socio-economic patterns. The patterns found in this study
mainly emphasized production only according to need, stronger person-product affinities
and significant connections between producer and consumer.
However, that many studies have remained conceptual (and – among this group – often
seemed to remain as conference papers and not turned into full journal papers) is currently
a hindrance to an evidence-based view of the phenomenon. There is need for more
empirical data, and from more fields than design and engineering.
Because the reviewed papers have come forth from mainly the engineering and production
planning professions, this has created a rather one-sided view on the consumer-producer
relationship that seems to stress only communications. As more laypeople gain access to
manufacturing technologies, however, this relationship is becoming more complex. The
true value of ‘co-design’ needs to be further unpacked in both research and practice, as it
appears to be a key factor differentiating distributed production from the mass production
mode. One-sided ‘cleaner production’ is not enough: production and consumption must be
evaluated together. A strategy of cleaner prosumption reconsiders not only how something
is produced, but what is produced (or prosumed) and why.
There is hence need for discussion on the valuing systems behind distributed production
activities involving material goods. This would serve practical, operational objectives and
clarify the axiological underpinnings. Many disciplinary and epistemic perspectives, from
economics and marketing to management science and organizational behaviour, may
contribute to this knowledge building.

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
5.2 Unknown consequences
There were also environmental implications arising from the reviewed papers and their
synthesis that were not discussed by the authors. Because of the heavy emphasis on
frameworks and identifying environmental benefits, combined with the lack of, for
instance, real-life case studies, the environmental harms (potentially) concomitant with a
decentralized production paradigm remained unacknowledged. This realization resulted in
the creation of a further ‘landscape’ of environmental concerns to supplement the previous
two (Figure 6), and the second contribution of this paper.
Figure 6: Threats to environmental sustainability in distributed production (arising from
but mainly not explicit in the reviewed papers).
Firstly, the more personal fabrication becomes (i.e. the further right in the map), the more
exposed the individual becomes to materials and processes and their as yet unknown
properties such as toxicity. This also means it is less certain that other safety mechanisms
are in place (as they would be in more established and regulated contexts such as
commercial activities). The risk of harmful emissions to the environment may also be
greater.
mass fabrication:
distanced from
consumer recycling
systems and safety
standards, increased
transport of
components and
materials
mass customization:
customized products
add to mass production
material flow rather than
replace
bespoke fabrication:
high quality leads to
resource and energy
intensive production,
difficulty to reuse
bespoke products
personal fabrication:
greater personal
exposure to toxic
materials/emissions,
unregulated emissions
to environment
ENVIRONMENTAL
CONCERNS
regulations and standards
scale
global
local
quality drivers less regulation

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
The fabrication of new types of products may additionally render them less amenable to
existing consumer recycling systems, e.g. for plastics, whether because of actual material
properties or barriers due to changed habits and routines. Moreover, even if some
consumer products are replaced by materials in new distribution arrangements and
environmental impacts associated with the retail infrastructure lessen, it is possible the
production, storage and distribution of materials and components (and their inherent
impacts) remain just as invisible to the consumer as the current mass production supply
chain is.
On the left side of the landscape, the reviewed papers had raised the concern of reusing and
recycling customized products. There are also several unstated implications: for instance it
remains unclear if the high quality production needed to better ensure product longevity
will involve more resources and energy that will ultimately counteract the environmental
gains from longer or more intense product use. It is also debatable whether mass
customization will replace some mass production material flow or simply add to it, not to
mention the growing environmental footprint of the internet and information and
communications technologies. Further observation and analysis may be able to determine
how these activities play out in time – and what time and scale settings are most
appropriate for study.
6. Conclusions
Distributed production holds promise of greater environmental sustainability, but it is not a
given that it will be a new, clearly cleaner production paradigm. The review illuminated
the opportunities for greater environmental sustainability as well as potential threats,
addressing of which could serve to improve these novel, emerging practices today. The
concept maps presented in the review summarize the reviewed papers’ positions on
environmental benefits and may also provide clues to how distributed production may be
defined and delimited as more research emerges.
This study has clarified what characterizes distributed production in its different forms,
what is already known or hypothesized regarding its dematerialization potential, and what
topics are fruitful arenas for further examination. The conceptualization can inspire and
legitimize practitioners’ experiments with business models, new customer-producer
relationships and novel, reconfigured prosumption networks. By flagging areas where

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Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
undesired environmental impacts may arise, the review guides further research and
encourages practitioners to take them into account in their current and future activities.
Acknowledgements
We are grateful to Tiina Härkäsalmi, Sampsa Hyysalo and Frank Steiner for suggestions
on previous drafts and we thank the editor and anonymous reviewers for their helpful
comments on our manuscript.
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Appendix A: Summary of sources: Journals
Journal Name,
Dates
Total
articles
Rele-
vant
Focus
(Journal’s Description)
Category
(Journal’s Description)
Eigenfactor
Category
Co-Design,
1(1) 2002 – 8(4)
2012
about
130
0
Research on nature of
collaborative design from
any desi gn domain.
Collaborative Design,
Design, Engineering and
Technology.
n/a
Design Studies,
23(1) 20 02 –
33(6) 20 12
about
330
1
Design activity, from
cognition and methodology
to values and philosophy.
Design Research in
Engineering, Architecture,
Products and Systems.
Robotics.
Ecological
Economics,
40(1) 20 02 – 84
2012
about
2240
0
Transdisciplinary.
Management of ecology
and econ omics.
Commentaries, surveys,
analyses, methodologies,
ideological options.
Environmental sciences.
Environmental Technology,
Policy and Management, etc.
Economics.
International
Journal of
Production
Economics
75(1-2) 2002 –
140(2) 2012
about
2570
3
Multidisciplinary. Interface
between engineering a nd
management; academic
approach and industrial
applicati ons.
Manufacturing and process
industries, production.
Operations
research.
Journal of
Cleaner
Production,
10(1) 20 02 –
37 2012
about
1880
2
Interdisciplinary.
Techniques, concepts and
policies.
Industrial applications and
Environmental Management,
Legislati on and Policy,
Education.
Environmental
Chemistry and
Microbiology.
Journal of
Consumer
Culture,
2(1) 2002 –
12(3) 20 12
about
160
0
Multidisciplinary. Theory
and empir ical.
Consumption and consumer
culture. Sociology. Cultural
Studies.
Sociology.
Journal of
Industrial
Ecology,
6(1) 2002 –
16(6) 20 12
about
530
0
Interdisciplinary.
Conceptual contributions,
findings from primary
research and practice.
'Industrial metab olism',
'industria l symbiosis'.
Environmental
Chemistry and
Microbiology.
Journal of
Sustainable
Development,
1(1) 2008 –
5(12) 20 12
about
560
2
Transdisciplinary. Original
research and reviews.
Environmental science,
technologies, economics and
policy; ecology; sustainable
development.
na
Rapid
Prototyping
Journal,
8(1) 2002 –
18(6) 20 12
about
415
5
Developments and
applicati ons in additive
manufacturing (AM).
Mechanical and Materials
Engineering.
Physics and
Chemistry.
Technological
Forecasting and
Social Change,
69(1) 20 02 –
79(9) 20 12
about
910
1
Multidisciplinary.
Methodology and practice
of technologica l foresight.
Technological Forecasting,
Futures Studies.
Management
Studies.

!
Please cite as
Kohtala, Cindy. 2015. “Addressing Sustainability in Research on Distributed Production: An Integrated Literature
Review.” Journal of Cleaner Production 106: 654–68.
Appendix B: Summary of sources: Conferences
Conference
Name
Conference
Description,
Focus
Year
Relevant
(Available Full
Paper)
No. of
sessions
total
Sustain-
ability
sessions
No. of papers/
presentations
total (in
Proceedings)
Sustainability
papers/
presentations
Additive
Manufacturing
Conferences
Industrialists and academics: Engineers, i nnovators, designers, busi ness managers, academics
and researchers, and AM mat erials and system developers.
‘Exceptio nal pa pers’ accepted.
2006
0
-
-
18
0
2007
0
-
-
15
0
2008
0
-
-
14
1
2009
0
7
0
14
0
2010
0
7
1
14
2
2011
0
7
0
14
0
2012
0
7
0
14
0
MCPC Conferences:
International
Conference on Mass
Customization &
Personalization
Interdisciplinary, scientists and practitioners. Innovation and research . Technological IT
infrastructures, design applications, success stories and business models.
Peer reviewed papers.
2003
3
14
1
117
4
2005
1
31
0
124
4
“Extreme
Customization”
2007
1
54
0
160
4
“Mass Matching:
Customization,
Configuration &
Creativity”
2009
(Proceedings
2010)
4
29
2
95
11
“Bridging Mass
Customization and
Open Innovation”
2011
6
41
3
144
13
PINC Conferences:
Participatory
Innovation
Conference
A spread in disciplines to cover innovation from several perspectives, including design,
anthropology, conversation analysis, business, management, and public proc urement.
Peer-reviewed papers.
2011
0
5
0
68
2