The capstone is a culminating project that allows students to use the skills they have learned in ESD in a real world industry or research project. The capstone projects often focus on interdisciplinary applications, solved by a team of students chosen appropriately from different pillars.

Electives, shown in pink in the diagram below, provide the opportunity for students to customise the ESD degree according to their interests and future careers. Electives compose 72 credits of the ESD undergraduate programme, from which at least 24 credits must come from ESD courses (with course code 40.2xx, 40.3xx, 01.02, 01.104 and 01.107). ESD offers a diverse set of electives, some are full term (12 credits) and some are half term (6 credits) courses. Pursuing one of ESD’s focus tracks can optionally help guide the selection of these electives. Technical Application Electives (TAEs) are a select list of university courses that provide breadth in a topic that typically spans across pillars. Currently TAEs are only offered in terms 7 and 8.

Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences (HASS) are an essential component of an SUTD degree. HASS courses, shown in purple, are required in all but one term of study. There are a variety of HASS courses that are a particular relevance to ESD. It is strongly recommended that ESD students supplement their technical engineering programme with HASS electives that build competence in economic reasoning. One recommended course is Microeconomics, the study of resource allocation under distributed economic decision making.

From AY2017 onwards, students who have, and maintain, a GPA of 3.5 or above (and have passed all Freshmore subjects) are eligible to enroll for an additional course in terms 5, 6 and/or 7. Subject to the prerequisites and timing of the course, students may use this flexibility to take an additional HASS or elective course.