Sustainable Metals for a Circular Economy

For more than five millennia metallic alloys have been serving as the backbone of civilization. Today more than 2 billion tons of metals are produced every year. The demand for some materials such as steels, aluminium and copper is expected to double or even triple by 2050.
Metals require a lot of energy for their extraction, synthesis and downstream manufacturing, qualifying them as the largest single industrial source of greenhouse gas emissions and energy consumption.

The success of metals thus brings them into a position where they must play an important role in addressing the associated environmental challenges and the coming of a partially circular economy. The presentation discusses pathways for improving the direct sustainability of metals, in areas including reduced-carbon-dioxide primary production, recycling, scrap-compatible alloy design, contaminant-tolerance of alloys and improved alloy longevity. The lecture also discusses the effectiveness and technological readiness of individual measures, and also shows how novel structural materials enable improved energy efficiency.
Open Access reference:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-019-1702-5
This talk was a Kelly lecture at the Cambridge University given by Prof Dierk Raabe.
©Dierk Raabe

Видео Sustainable Metals for a Circular Economy канала Max Planck Institute for Sustainable Materials