# Design for recycling in electronic manufacturing: enabling circularity and lower impact manufacturing through heterogeneous integration and lower impact recovery

## TL;DR

This paper introduces a new design-for-recycling approach in electronics manufacturing that enables high material recovery and significantly reduces environmental impact.

## Contribution

A scalable DfR approach with 99% material recovery and 90% lower environmental impact compared to conventional methods is presented.

## Key findings

- A DfR approach enables up to 99% material recovery using scalable laboratory methods.
- Life Cycle Assessment shows a 90% reduction in environmental impact compared to conventional FR4-based manufacturing.
- Selective recovery using Iron Chloride enables silver recovery through mechanical filtration.

## Abstract

The adoption of ‘Design-for-Recycling’ (DfR) approaches for manufacturing Electrical and Electronic Equipment is still in its infancy. However, growing interest in DfR is driven by its potential to address the global challenge of waste from electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) and reduce the environmental footprint of electronics. In this study, a DfR approach that enables up to 99% material recovery using scalable laboratory methods is presented. Through Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), a 90% reduction in environmental impact compared to conventional Flame-Retardant Level 4 (FR4)-based printed circuit board assemblies manufacturing is demonstrated. To achieve this, a fully additive process is adopted with Heterogeneous integration using Ultra-Precise Deposition (UPD) to provide a more compact form factor with lower material use than conventional approaches. For recycling trials, selective recovery using Iron Chloride (FeCl₃) was adopted, enabling silver (Ag) to be recovered by mechanical filtration. The LCA results indicate a notable reduction in environmental impact and human toxicity, primarily due to the lower substrate footprint, reduced reagent use, the ease of disassembly and resource retention enabled by the DfR design. The results show that the integration of DfR principles with recycling establishes a new standard for electronics manufacturing, where technological performance and environmental accountability are simultaneously pursued.