Efficient Copper Reduction And Recycling By Fiber Optic Switching For Automotive Lighting Systems

The original motivation for this project came from an interest in preserving the quality of recycled steel by reducing the amount of copper that ultimately ends up in steel production. There are a number of factors propelling this kind of research. One is that our newly mined iron resources are finite, expensive and non-renewable. By working on a project with a large motivation in recycling and environmental issues, students become aware of contemporary issues surrounding the global environment and green engineering. One design path to reduce copper is to reduce the amount going into automobiles during their production. Another is to provide efficient means for retrieving the copper before recycling. The student design team followed both paths; substituting fiber optic switching for part of the copper circuit that controls electrically powered components in a car, and re-designing the electrical power distribution in the car so that it can be efficiently removed at end-of-life, before recycling.