Now another new technology is gaining traction that may change the world. 3D Printing/Additive Manufacturing (AM) is a revolutionary emerging technology that could up-end the last two centuries of approaches to design and manufacturing with profound geopolitical, economic, social, demographic, environmental, and security implications…
We didn’t write that. It’s the beginning of a fantastic new report titled,
“Could 3D Printing Change the World? Technologies, Potential, and Implications of Additive Manufacturing,” which you can download here. It’s the latest Strategic Foresight Initiative Report, co-authored by Thomas Campbell, Christopher Williams, Olga Ivanova, and Banning Garrett.” It’s sponsored by The Atlantic Council of the United States, a non-partisan organization that promotes constructive US and European leadership and engagement in international affairs based on the central role of the Atlantic community in meeting today’s global challenges.
This 15-page report is a must-read. The report covers these broad implications:
- Assembly lines and supply chains could be reduced or eliminated for many products. AM can produce the final product — or large pieces of a final product — in one process.
- Designs, not products, would move around the world as digital files are printed anywhere with any printer to meet design parameters. A “STL design file can be sent via the Internet and printed in 3D.
- Products could be printed on demand without the need for inventories.
- A given manufacturing facility would be capable of printing a huge range of products without retooling—and each printing could be customized without additional cost.
- Production and distribution of material products could become de-globalized as production is brought closer to the consumer.
- Manufacturing could be pulled away from “manufacturing platforms like China back to the countries where the products are consumed, reducing global economic imbalances as export countries’ surpluses are reduced and importing countries’ reliance on imports shrink.
- The carbon footprint of manufacturing and transport as well as overall energy use in manufacturing could be reduced substantially and thus global “resource productivity greatly enhanced and carbon emissions reduced.
- Reduced need for labor in manufacturing could be politically destabilizing in some economies while others, especially aging societies, might benefit from the ability to produce more goods with fewer people while reducing reliance on imports.
- The United States, the current leader in AM technology, could experience a renaissance in innovation, design, IP exports, and manufacturing, enhancing its relative economic strength and geopolitical influence.
Read it. Pass it around. Share your thoughts here.
Thanks for sharing
Absolutely – 3D printing will impact the world, and for the better. Particularly in areas of limited space (For example on board the International Space Station or on future space outposts).
The design rather than production will become most valued. 3D designer will be one of the jobs of the future, worth investigating now.
How Much Longer Until 3D Printing Changes Everything? Would be a better title. When haven’t we exploited a new technological revolution? I believe 3D printing is going to make every financial model an outdated joke. It will bring the extinction of money and corporations. Once printers can print more printers from recycled or organicly grown substances, there will be no need for stores or economies. Whole towns and cities will be built for free.