Approaches Towards Sustainable Use and Substitution of Metals in Electronics

The specific requirements of sustainable development in particular the core postulate of intergenerational equity— are a challenge in particular for the use of non-renewable resources. Metals with their infinite recycling potential facilitate decoupling metal use and metal consumption. New methodologies were deduced focusing on this core postulate: an alternative approach towards mass flow considerations and a new efficiency approach introducing horizontal and vertical efficiency of metal resource use. The methodologies were applied to lead-free soldering in the electronics industry. Lead-free soldering globally will additionally consume the power generation of around 1 nuclear power plant. At the same time, it will increase the horizontal efficiency of ores containing bismuth. Data lacks did not allow calculating the overall horizontal efficiency. The works described here are just a section of the total research that has been conducted mainly in the EFSOT project in Europe, which was funded by the European Commission. It is important to highlight that the use of the infinite recycling potential is not the only and "at all cost" parameter to be considered. It needs to be balanced with other essential parameters of sustainable development — toxicity, energy consumption, economic aspects, the impacts of technical progress. The overall best metal selection for a specific application provides efficient functionality at minimum primary metal resource consumption, causes minimum energy consumption all over the life cycle, minimum toxic releases into the environment, and a good life cycle cost performance supporting appropriate ecologically preferable end-of-life treatments.