Please could you briefly explain your role, involvement, and experience with regards to remanufacturing/the circular economy.
Stuart Bradley (SB): I work on the development of electrical machines, power electronics and drives at Ricardo’s Midlands Technical Centre in Leamington, in the UK. I have a particular focus on improving how these systems are applied and in the context of end-of life and the decisions to remanufacture, re-use and recycle.
How much do you think remanufacturing/improved end-of-life processes could contribute to companies meeting their Net-zero targets?
SB: The change to low carbon transport has encouraged the adoption of greater electrification, including power electronics and electrical machines of all types and sizes. At Ricardo, we are working on this transition, and in particular the electrical driveline for automotive applications. The volume of these machines and drives will increase significantly, and this brings challenges in terms of material selection, sustainability and end-of-life decisions. By being able to re-use and remanufacture, the overall environmental impact of making these devices can be reduced by virtue of energy and consumables reduction and retaining much of the original device value.
In your opinion, is there growing interest in remanufacturing/recycling components at the end of their working lives? What do you think is the main barrier for some companies not prioritising end-of-life strategies currently and how do you think this could be overcome?
SB: Electrical machines have been remanufactured for decades, for example, by being “re-wound”. This action would replace the machine windings and insulation system, which may have been damaged, and the re-winding assessment and process would therefore retain the rotor, shaft and laminated stacks, but replace the copper conductors (and usually the bearings). The same is not true of power electronics, and this is an area of significant technical challenge and interest. If the components in the electrical driveline can be monitored, assessed and their end-of-life decision hierarchy implemented, there will be significant commercial advantage gained. The barrier to implementation is the lack of knowledge on linking birth history, service life events and repair strategy that makes the commercial case difficult and costly to exploit. We are feeling the pull from manufacturers which produce fewer than 10,000 electrified vehicles per year, and we are currently assessing the commercial viability of a facility to assemble battery packs for these OEMs. As part of the study, harnessing our world-renowned expertise in batteries, we are exploring opportunities to minimise the environmental impact of battery pack manufacture through ‘second life processing’ and recycling of core elements from construction.
Regarding new technologies for remanufacturing/recycling what would you say are the ones to watch for the future?
SB: I’m watching the development of electrical driveline remanufacturing processes, and in particular the work on recovering valuable materials from machines and drives, including recovery of used, but reusable components. I think that machines in particular could be reused, and a second life for those machines might be found in commercial acceptable ICE vehicle conversion for example. First life in a Nissan Leaf, second life in a Mazda MX5 e-conversion?
Do you think it is important for different sectors to learn from each other when it comes to remanufacturing, recycling, and re-use?
SB: For automotive propulsion electrical machines, I think that there is much to be learned from industries that already make and remake machines, especially on robustness and graceful degradation and the control of those topics. An example might be the use of high phase number machines that are connected to modular inverters, allowing a fault to be isolated and the machine to carry on working in a degraded state. The sensors, monitoring and control systems for these machines can be adapted for other applications where that approach would be a technical advantage.
Why is it important for engineers to join this event on Remanufacturing Processes 2021?
SB: The move to a low-carbon and clean economy is critical to environmental health, sustainability and there is no bigger challenge! Engineers can change the world for the better, and the reduction of waste and materials is critical to this work. If we can find ways to use, reuse and remanufacture, there will be commercial advantages for those adopters, and potentially a significant improvement in the cost base for these essential technologies such as electric machines and drives.
The Remanufacturing Processes seminar will take place at the Manufacturing Technology Centre on 23 November 2021.
The event will bring together the foremost OEMs, researchers and end users to share innovative remanufacturing processes, highlight new technologies and discuss end of life initiatives for new technologies, covering electric vehicle batteries, wind turbines, E-Machines and more.
For full details and to book your place, please visit the event website.