Upcoming Events

Since the beginning of our century, we have got used to throwing away our electronic devices and replace them with much modern and updated versions every couple of years. This has a tremendous environmental impact that is often disregarded. One of the components that is incorrectly discarded is also one the most hazardous: the battery. The most alarming factor is that batteries use and consumption is expected to rise significantly in the following years due to the growth of small-sized portable appliances in the internet-of-things scenario. In view of this perspective, tightened environmental laws and increased provisions for recycling infrastructures (primary battery collection and processing) are urgently needed. However, this scenario is not conducive in the short-term in developing economies due to the high cost and complexity of implementation. Indeed, this may not be environmentally sustainable even for developed economies either; building-up costly and energy-consuming recycling plants to take care of the batteries generated along the linear “take-make-dispose” path followed traditionally since the early days of industrialization entails a huge waste of natural resources, energy and labour. The talk will address the solutions proposed by Sabateto supply sustainable energy to small-sized electronic products and to develop digital sensing devices with minimal electronic content as an example of the new generation of sustainable devices to come.