In 2014, consumers around the world discarded about 42 million metric tons of e-waste, according to a report by the United Nations University. This poses an environmental and human threat because electronic products are made up of many components, some of which are toxic or non-degradable. To help address the issue, Xinlong Wang and colleagues sought to develop a degradable material that could be used for electronic substrates or insulators.
The researchers started with polylactic acid, or PLA, which is a bioplastic that can be derived from corn starch or other natural sources and is already used in the packaging, electronics and automotive industries. PLA by itself, however, is brittle and flammable, and doesn't have the right electrical properties to be a good electronic substrate or insulator. But the researchers found that blending metal-organic framework nanoparticles with PLA resulted in a transparent film with the mechanical, electrical and flame retardant properties that make the material a promising candidate for use in electronics.
Original Study: DOI: 10.1021/acs.iecr.6b04204
(Score: 2) by tizan on Friday April 21 2017, @10:43PM
You are among the minority...at least from my observation...it is different in lesser developed part of the world though.
I am the only one in my family and colleagues who has a cell phone which is 5 years old and a laptop 8 years old.
all around me change cell phone every 2 to 3 years and change laptop/tablets every 2 to 5 years.
Most of these are well functioning and non bio-degradable...but nobody re-use them...a smalll fraction are donated to some charity but most end up in the dump or the so called recycling system which ends up heavily polluting some place in China or India as far as i know.
So if all the plastic rot and the metal can be salvaged or kept from contaminating water then i am for it because it will reduce dump volume and trash from a large number of electronic consumers in the developed world. In the less developed world the majority of the people tend to keep and use electronics for longer time...so a life of 10 years or more is good for these customers.