Substitution of Ag in Electronic conductive inks (SAGE)

This project plans to develop highly conductive carbon based inks to replace the current silver based inks. The price of silver has escalated four fold in the last five years, driven by scarcity and increasing use. Silver is harmful in the waste stream as it is highly soluble and toxic to aquatic life. Silver mining is environmentally and socially unacceptable, whereas carbon can easily be sourced from current recycling, and will have a significantly lower life cycle impact. Carbon based inks have traditionally had poor conductivity, but recent commercial raw materials developments point to an order of magnitude improvement by adding graphene & graphene nano-clusters. The project aims to produce a ten fold increase in conductivity, and develop the processing and design rules for these new materials. The inks are intended for the rapidly expanding smart packaging arena but can be expanded into numerous other markets. This project will facilitate in making an important advance in this area.