This paper explores the concept of frugality to help designers in optimizing the resources needed for the design of products. A metric proposes to integrate the geographical origin of the components which participate at the achievement of the product's functions. The resulting profile gives a global notation of the frugality, and suggests ways of improvement by targeting functions that are less frugal. A case study on a solar water distiller supports the proposal in order to prove the efficiency of the methodology.

Measuring Frugality - Application to a Solar Water Distiller