IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ids/ijtlid/v10y2018i3-4p231-257.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Frugal innovation approaches to sustainable domestic energy: two cases of solar water heating from Brazil

Author

Listed:
  • Hans-Christian Busch
  • Tobias Dauth
  • Luise Fischer
  • Marcelo Souza

Abstract

This paper aims to shed light on sustainability oriented frugal innovation. We explore how frugal approaches to innovation can be used as affordable and environmentally sustainable alternatives to established water heater systems. Using a descriptive case study approach, two examples of frugal innovators in Brazil are being depicted. We develop a better understanding how frugal approaches to solving similar environmental problems vary between different organisational forms. Moreover, we investigate in which situations a frugal approach to sustainable innovation appears to be suitable. Our findings indicate that distinct approaches to frugal innovation can be pursued developing environmentally sustainable and affordable technology. Comparing a grassroots non-profit organisation to a for-profit corporation, we identify different degrees of relational importance of frugality in environmental sustainability. We show that frugal approaches represent viable alternatives in achieving circular products and that these approaches can contribute to a socially inclusive form of environmentally friendly domestic energy use.

Suggested Citation

  • Hans-Christian Busch & Tobias Dauth & Luise Fischer & Marcelo Souza, 2018. "Frugal innovation approaches to sustainable domestic energy: two cases of solar water heating from Brazil," International Journal of Technological Learning, Innovation and Development, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 10(3/4), pages 231-257.
  • Handle: RePEc:ids:ijtlid:v:10:y:2018:i:3/4:p:231-257
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.inderscience.com/link.php?id=93725
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Achtelik, Timo & Herstatt, Cornelius & Tiwari, Rajnish, 2022. "Frugal sustainability: A new perspective to foster corporate sustainability," Working Papers 112, Hamburg University of Technology (TUHH), Institute for Technology and Innovation Management, revised 2022.
    2. Simone Sehnem & Adriane A. Farias S. L. de Queiroz & Susana Carla Farias Pereira & Gabriel dos Santos Correia & Edson Kuzma, 2022. "Circular economy and innovation: A look from the perspective of organizational capabilities," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(1), pages 236-250, January.
    3. Daniel A. Salas & Paulina Criollo & Angel D. Ramirez, 2021. "The Role of Higher Education Institutions in the Implementation of Circular Economy in Latin America," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(17), pages 1-27, August.
    4. Dabić, Marina & Obradović, Tena & Vlačić, Božidar & Sahasranamam, Sreevas & Paul, Justin, 2022. "Frugal innovations: A multidisciplinary review & agenda for future research," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 142(C), pages 914-929.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ids:ijtlid:v:10:y:2018:i:3/4:p:231-257. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sarah Parker (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.inderscience.com/browse/index.php?journalID=240 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.