Printed Electronics x PCBs

06/02/2025

Printed Electronics vs. Printed Circuit Boards: A Sustainable Comparison

Printed electronics (PE) are emerging as a promising alternative to conventional printed circuit boards (PCBs), offering significant advantages in terms of sustainability, design flexibility, and performance. This groundbreaking evaluation study conducted by Corne Rentrop, Jan Brusselaers, and Marieke van Diemen highlights the substantial environmental benefits of PE compared to traditional PCBs.

Key Benefits of Printed Electronics

Printed electronics are revolutionizing the industry by providing:

  • Lower energy, water, and raw material consumption: PE production processes require far less energy, water, and raw materials than conventional PCB manufacturing.
  • Flexible, transparent, and stretchable designs: These properties allow for a variety of new applications in wearable tech, flexible displays, and more.
  • Breathable properties: These enable PE to be used in unique ways, such as in the healthcare sector for wearable devices that require moisture permeability.

Key Findings from the Study

The study compared the environmental impacts of printed electronics and printed circuit boards, revealing some impressive outcomes:

  1. Lower Environmental Impact: PE outperforms PCB across all sustainability indicators. It demonstrates significantly higher resource efficiency and lower pollution intensity, making it a far more environmentally friendly option.
  2. Significantly Reduced Energy & Material Use: One of the most striking differences is that the water-intensive PCB industry couldn’t even be mathematically compared to PE’s zero-water production process. This highlights a substantial reduction in water consumption for PE manufacturing.
  3. Lighter by a Factor of 16.14: Per surface area, PE is over 16 times lighter than a typical 2-layer PCB. This reduction in weight opens up new opportunities for applications where weight is a critical factor, such as in mobile devices, aerospace, and automotive industries.

Conclusion

The study offers compelling evidence that printed electronics are a superior alternative to conventional printed circuit boards in terms of environmental sustainability. With their reduced energy and material use, flexibility in design, and lighter weight, printed electronics are paving the way for innovative applications across a variety of industries.

For a deeper dive into the findings, read the full paper here.