Search

The paper describes a modeling tool developed to evaluate environmental impact of both HDI and conventional PWB fabrication processes. It includes impact of energy, water, and process chemicals. It also factors energy generation source based on manufacturing locale. Several product emulators will be used to demonstrate how the modeling tool can be used to assess impact of interconnect design alternatives. Results include Global Warming Potential (GWP) Impact vs Board Area for various designs and PWB technologies.

The evolution of the Photonics Systems Manufacturing Consortium (PSMC) and its activities and tentative results are discussed. The PSMC evolved from the long standing optical electronic roadmap activities of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Micro Photonics Center Communications Technology Roadmap (MIT MPC CTR) and the international Network for Manufacturing Innovation (iNEMI) when these two organization jointly responded to and won a National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) RFQ to roadmap photonic integrated circuits and applications in May of 2014. PSMC has made much progress reported herein since then. In July of 2015, the formation of the American Institute for Manufacturing Integrated Photonics (AIM-IP) was announced. Subsequently, PSMC joined AIM-IP and is now expanding its role to include more applications of optical electronics technology. In addition, PSMC is running a series of workshops and seminars to gather information, in the first case, and to educate interested parties in the second case. The near term PSMC objective is to define gaps and technical needs in optical electronic that are, or will become, barriers to utilizing optical technologies in applications. The tentative results as of early December 2015 are reported as well as the intended activities over the next few years. The long term PSMC objective is to contribute to the AIM IP purpose of establishing a self-sustaining institution based on fulfilling the technology needs to enable the growth of optical electronics in data communications, sensors and other applications.

Firms may have a number of motivations for understanding the carbon footprint of an information and communication technology product. Meeting corporate sustainability targets, complying with emissions reductions mandates, or achieving “green” products rankings are frequent motivators, but, increasingly, eco-label schemes are beginning to pressure early adopters and laggards alike to calculate and understand their product's carbon footprints. However, the rules by which carbon footprints are calculated continue to evolve as the understanding of the science behind calculations improves. This document provides an overview of several leading information technology labels and standards, as well as the European Union's efforts to refine and validate the associated measurement methodologies.

There is growing need for effective and efficient environmental assessment tools for information technology (IT) products. This paper presents a streamlined life cycle analysis (LCA) methodology using a screening and triage approach. The methodology is applied to the case study of liquid crystal displays (LCDs). Global warming potential uncertainty is reduced by identifying and resolving uncertainty around key drivers of impact. The resolution of impact continues until a meaningful level of reduction of uncertainty is achieved, such as the ability to discriminate one class of LCD from another.

One of the goals of The Sustainability Consortium (TSC) is to bridge the divide between rigorous scientific analysis of the life cycle of consumer goods and the ability of the purchaser/ consumer to absorb and act on the environmental impact information provided from such an analysis. TSC has approached this issue through the development of the Sustainability Measurement and Reporting System (SMRS), which describes a process that facilitates the communication of environmental impacts derived from life cycle analysis to a broader lay audience. Based on ISO 14025 Type III environmental declarations, the SMRS provides the common rules for reporting impacts and creates a product declaration that can underpin any number of consumer communication modes. This paper presents the SMRS methodology and its application to laptop computers.

This investigation revealed that the thermodynamic reactions that occur during Al remelting may lead to material losses for specific elements and circumstances. Mg losses as a result of oxidation are thermodynamically favorable to occur, but are limited by the exposure of Mg particulates to the oxygen atmosphere. Volatilization of Mn may also contribute to material losses, which is also limited by the materials exposure to the oxygen atmosphere. The relatively short melt processing times and the protective dross layer may largely limit the oxidation of Mg and volatilization of Mn. Material losses from the formation of second phase precipitates were shown to be exclusively a concern for the formation of second phase particles with densities less than Al. The low density of Al severely limited the potential compounds that could contribute to material losses. A study on the formation of pure Si second phase particles demonstrated that the particles would need to be approximately 40 µm to reach the dross under normal processing conditions. Particles of other compositions are expected to require much larger melting periods to reach the dross because the low density of Si allows it to serve as the lower bound of the time requirement. Dross chemistry was shown to influence the material yield. Batch planners should consider which fluxes are implemented in the modeled process to accurately predict batch plans. Aluminum recycling batch planners should also be prepared to update their batch plans as the popularity of chemically reactive fluxes and dross reprocessing for material recovery increases. Better management methods for compositional uncertainty resulting from thermodynamic effects will allow creation of batch plans for Al alloy products that increase incorporation of secondary metals, thereby reducing energy consumption in Al production while simultaneously providing economic benefits.

THE energy burden of information and communication technology (ICT) has been growing rapidly as an increasing demand from the market results in newer products with high use rates. Previous studies have estimated that the rapid increase in energy demand of ICT could result in energy bottlenecks in certain areas, in particular network applications [1]–[3]. Emerging technologies such as photonics-integrated electronics could offer a breakthrough in reducing the energy consumed in ICT equipment. We present an analysis of the current energy trends in ICT as well as a discussion of the impact of photonics on energy use within this industry.

Several pressures have led to unprecedented corporate interest in “carbon footprinting” or life cycle assessment (LCA) of products. These pressures include historically high energy prices, climate change regulation, corporate sustainability efforts, and announcements from several major retailers that environmental data will be required from suppliers. There are significant challenges in standardizing such calculations and several proposed standards include those from the British Standards Institute, the International Standards Organization, and the World Resources Institute/World Business Council on Sustainable Development [1, 2]. This work discusses the particular challenges relevant to the information technologies (IT) industry's ongoing investigation into the environmental impact of their products. IT products are complex and experience high turnover both in their manufacturing and assembly process flows as well as the supply chains used to procure materials and components. Often the results of quantifying environmental impacts are dominated by significant uncertainty and variability in the calculation of footprints, particularly for complicated products with large supplier networks. The existence of uncertainty is undisputed, and yet efforts to quantify uncertainty and variability in carbon footprints and life cycle assessments remain nascent at best. This research helps elucidate the data and methodological challenges in assessing uncertainties in the carbon footprinting of laptop and desktop computers.

Through the development of a general model of electronics recycling systems, the effect of product portfolio choices on economic and environmental system performance is explored. The general model encompasses the three main functions of a recycling system - collection, processing, and system management - and allows for the effect of both contextual and architectural inputs - including product scope - to be explored. Overall model results indicate that collecting a broader portfolio of products can be economically favorable, even for cases in which lower-value products are added to a recycling system. In these cases, the higher total mass throughputs that are realized by the collection of additional product types can help to drive down the cost per unit mass collected. Expanding product scope can also yield improvements in environmental performance, as the energy per unit mass collected can also decrease with higher mass throughputs.

Materials selection decisions exhibit great influence on the environmental performance of firms through their impact on processing technology, product form, and supply chain configuration. Consequently, materials dictate a product's environmental profile via the burden associated with extraction and refining, transformation from material to product, product performance characteristics during use, and potential recovery at end-of-life (EOL). While lifecycle assessment (LCA) methods provide quantitative input to a product designer's materials selection decision, LCA implementations are evolving and disparate. This work explores several analytical variations of LCA related to the allocation of recycling impacts at product EOL and the implications of these variants across a range of contexts. Stylized analyses across a range of materials are presented, focusing on materials with varying primary and secondary materials production burdens. This work illustrates that a) the application of distinct EOL allocation methods give different values of cumulative environmental impact for the same material, b) these impacts change at differing rates between the various methods, and c) these disparities can result in different rank ordering of materials preference. Characterizing this behavior over a range of parameters illustrates the potential trends in allocation method bias for or against particular materials classes.

A general model for evaluating the economic and environmental performance of electronics recycling systems is developed. This model comprehends the three main functions in a recycling system - collection, processing, and system management - and aims to enable quantification of the impact of context and system architecture on the performance of electronics recycling systems. Different modeling techniques are used, including process-based cost models, to evaluate economic performance, and life cycle assessment tools, to evaluate environmental performance. A case study, based loosely on Maine, is presented to show the utility of such a model in evaluating electronics recycling systems.

Electronics original equipment manufacturers are coming under increased scrutiny regarding their environmental performance, particularly around the issue of recycling. To address this pressure, companies need metrics that resolve the effectiveness of candidate recycling strategies. Such metrics not only provide guidance on the design and operation of recycling systems, but also serve to communicate the effectiveness of efforts to regulators and nongovernmental organizations. A methodology for a set of robust metrics is presented, designed to allow for comparison between companies. These metrics are based on both mass-based recycling rates normalized by present sales and sales based on product lifetime, along with value-weighted recycling rates that can correlate to environmental performance. These metrics provide insight on the performance of end-of-life electronics collection programs and how they might be compared to recycling of other waste streams, such as municipal solid waste.