A framework to evaluate eco-innovative concepts

National audienceEco-innovation is the development of products, services or processes which bring value to the customers and the company while reducing significantly the environmental impacts. Within the eco-innovation process, the evaluation is crucial. It is defined as the stage where a proportion of concepts are selected for further development. Nevertheless systematic methods for the early evaluation of ideas are scarce, above when it requires to assess the concepts with environmental or social criteria. This paper is focused in the evaluation stage and proposes a framework to qualify and evaluation eco-innovation concepts generated during the eco-ideation stage. This framework is based on a systemic thinking, so the design team must qualify the concept at different levels (users, value chain and society) in order to limit the potential rebound effects, and is linked with the eco-ideation method previously developed in order to allow the maturation of the concepts and the iterative process between the generation and evaluation stage. As this paper is a first step of the research process, the framework is tested on a real case study coming from a French start-up company