a mobile application to track your personal carbon footprint
DURATION
7 Weeks
ROLES
Visual Design, Interface Design, Interaction Design, Wireframing, Prototyping, User Research
TOOLS
Figma, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop
PROJECT OVERVIEW
Verdant is an academic case study created for a senior level user experience course, IAT 334, at Simon Fraser University. For this project, we were tasked to establish a domain to research and work within it to develop and propose a meaningful digital intervention.
Verdant is a mobile application that tracks your personal carbon footprint. Designed with an intent to help the users visualize the amount of carbon dioxide that they produce from their daily lifestyle. In using the application, our goal is to help users live a more environmentally friendly lifestyle.
With an interest in global warming, our team decided to explore the domain of environmental awareness. Global warming has been an ongoing issue for people around the world. With carbon dioxide emissions gradually rising, many people are beginning to be more conscious about their lifestyles and how they can reduce their personal carbon footprint.
RESEARCH
In order to better understand the domain our design would exist within and the potential areas for intervention, we conducted a survey. The primary goal of this survey was to help us gain a sense of the current relationship individuals share with the environment and how they perceive their environmental impact. Our primary research allowed us to gather diverse responses from over 50 participants with ages ranging from 18-61 years old.
When thinking of carbon footprints, individuals tend to associate their transportation methods with how positive or negative their impact is. However, there are other factors, such as products purchased, that must be taken into consideration when calculating one’s overall carbon dioxide emission.
A common theme amongst the responses was their willingness to change their lifestyle and take action to prevent further damage to the environment. However, they were unsure of exactly how their life currently impacts the Earth and what measures they should take to live more environmentally friendly.
DESIGN PROCESS
The domain of environmental awareness can encompass a wide range of topics, however through our primary research we were able to discover an area of intervention. As a team we were interested in focusing on answering the question,
After a rapid brainstorming session, our group came to a consensus and decided to move forward with a carbon footprint tracking application. From the research and insights collected, we synthesized our data to create a persona that would represent our target audience. The foundation of our design was established using our persona as it mapped out the goals and motivations of our users. We developed a journey map to better understand the potential touchpoints that could be used to target areas of intervention.
Targeted persona & an experience map highlighting potential areas of intervention.
Considering there were several features to the application, our team split up the tasks to iterate on different aspects of the application. We went through several design iterations. We began with grey wireframes and slowly implementing colour to create higher fidelity mockups after creating a design style guide for the application.
Main screen ideations.
Transportation logging ideations.
Prior to finalizing the design of our application, we conducted user testing with 14 participants through video (Zoom) interviews. Through user testing, we gathered insights and feedback on the core workflows of our application design. In order to understand whether the intention for the application were clear, we allowed the users to explore the application without any guidance. It was important for us analyze tests of individuals outside of our group. By doing this, we were able to monitor how they naturally navigated through the flow and reacted with the design. Moving forward we provided scenarios to the participants, monitored their behaviour, and noted any thoughts, questions, or concerns they had while interacting with the workflow.
They were unsure if the values should be interpreted as positive or negative since there was no basis for comparison or recommended value provided.
For logging transportation, not enough alternative options were given regarding how people travel, whether it be through carpooling, driving more than one automotive vehicle, or utilizing other forms of transportation such as a motorcycle
Our initial design did not feel as cohesive due to the various user flows we introduced. The core feature of tracking users’ carbon dioxide emissions felt incomplete since there was no clear end goal. More focus on improving the experience of logging emission activities had to be established. We achieved this by removing the “Explore” tab, which helped in reducing the information clutters.
FEATURE BREAKDOWN
The main profile displays all the analytical data regarding the user’s personal carbon footprint that have been gathered over time. A visual chart showcases weekly and monthly emission amongst the different categories. Users are able to view each category separately along with a detailed breakdown of their logged activities. Friends’ emissions and activities can also be viewed on this screen.
While transportation and purchases are two activities that first come to mind in regard to carbon footprints, Verdant also offers the ability to track emissions created from water and electricity. The application provides easy methods to input users' carbon emission activities with the option of tracking the travel details in real-time with the automatic function, scanning utility bills or manually inputting the details of their activities. For manual inputs, the application will calculate the emission based on rough estimations. For transportation activity tracking, an option is provided to allow users to split their emissions amongst their friends if they are carpooling.
Users are encouraged to track their progress and explore their unique journey to b ecoming more sustainable. With the use of personal activity goals, the primary objective is to ensure users are able to find methods to reduce their carbon footprint and feel accomplished while doing it. When a milestone is achieved, a popup notification will display to indicate how their actions have influenced their overall carbon footprint.
CONCLUSION
After completing this project, I am glad we chose to work in the domain of environmental awareness. Although it is a well-known topic, not many people understand the concept of it. Throughout this project, my team and I struggled with understanding how carbon footprint was calculated. Being able to learn about how carbon emissions work as we were designing helped us to iterate and further develop our ideas. I am proud of the extensive process and iterations we went through to get to the final product. This project taught me the importance of user testing, especially A/B testing when you have various features to showcase. Overall, this project has allowed me to improve many skills. As this was the first time I had to work on a project entirely remotely, it was very important to maintain and develop teamwork and communication skills
