At the same pace that more and more attention is given to environmental issues associated to the end of life of manufactured goods, the disposal of aircrafts at the end of their useful life is increasingly perceived as a problem that deserves attention, since the current general practice is still to dispose the retired aircrafts in ‘cemeteries’ around the globe. This problem has become even more critical with the growing trend of composite materials use in aeronautical structures, whose disposal and/or recycling processes are still complex, with few practical solutions. In the research study described in this paper, a method for developing contextual DFE criteria lists is proposed. It can be applied to the initial phases of the product development process and it might help the designers develop aircraft structures that are easier to be recycled or disposed at the end of their life cycle. The method is validated by comparing the resultant design of two similar aircraft critical structural parts, one of them was developed considering a criteria list deployed as from the proposed method, in relation to their disposability. The results demonstrated that the proposed DFE list increased the disposability of the component by not allowing the use of certain design solutions that cannot be easily recycled with the currently available recycling methods.