Bio­ba­sed dE­grad­able flAme re­Tar­dant pRIn­ted eCo-​elEctronics - BEA­TRI­CE

Pro­ject sum­ma­ry

The rapid growth of short-​lived com­mer­cial elec­tro­nic pro­ducts cau­ses in­crea­sing amounts of elec­tro­nic waste. The fossil-​based na­tu­re and per­sis­tence of elec­tro­nic cir­cuit boards con­tri­bu­te to en­vi­ron­men­tal pro­blems, e.g. in the case of waste pol­lu­ti­on. The non-​recyclable ther­mo­sets used so far cause a high car­bon foot­print and costs for the se­pa­ra­ti­on of me­tals and or­ga­nic com­po­n­ents. Our goal is to de­ve­lop de­mons­tra­tors of elec­tro­nic as­sem­blies using sus­tain­able raw ma­te­ri­als as car­ri­er sub­stra­tes on an en­gi­nee­ring scale to en­able re­cy­cling th­rough a bio­de­gra­da­ti­on pro­cess of the com­po­si­te ma­te­ri­al as a po­ten­ti­al key for cost-​efficient and en­vi­ron­mental­ly friend­ly stra­te­gic metal re­cy­cling. Po­ten­ti­al ap­p­li­ca­ti­ons in­clu­de wi­de­ly used com­mer­cial elec­tro­nic pro­ducts with prin­ted cir­cuit boards, par­ti­cu­lar­ly short-​life elec­tro­nics. Im­pact and po­ten­ti­al be­ne­fits are re­du­ced en­vi­ron­men­tal im­pact, im­pro­ved reuse of stra­te­gic me­tals and re­du­ced Eu­ropean de­pen­dence on ex­ter­nal sources.