Organic EL Recycling System for Cost Reduction
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Solution Overview
Problem
The high manufacturing costs of organic EL lighting devices are primarily due to expensive materials and complex production processes, making it difficult to establish a profitable business, with a significant portion of costs attributed to organic EL element materials, anode transparent electrode boards, and sealing members, and existing recycling methods only focus on collecting metals without considering the entire device.
Innovation Solution
A comprehensive collecting/recycling system for organic EL lighting devices that includes information collecting and processing means to track panel status, predicting re-utilizable components and materials, and setting production plans for recycled panels, utilizing a timekeeping timer, optical sensors, and information processing devices to optimize recycling and reutilization.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If organic EL lighting devices are manufactured using conventional methods with expensive materials (organic materials, inorganic materials, metals, adhesive agents), then high performance and reliability are achieved, but manufacturing cost becomes extremely high making profitable business difficult
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a comprehensive recycling system that collects used organic EL panels and recovers valuable materials including organic light-emitting materials, noble metals (platinum, iridium), rare earth metals (lithium), and high-purity metals (aluminum, silver). This recovery process directly addresses the high material cost by reclaiming expensive components from discarded panels, enabling cost-effective manufacturing while maintaining product performance through reused materials
2Ease of manufacture
If comprehensive recycling of organic EL panels is implemented to reduce material costs, then manufacturing cost decreases and profitability improves, but systematic management of collection and recycling processes becomes complex
Solution Approach 1:
The recycling system is divided into distinct functional modules: information collecting means (capturing panel usage data), information processing means (storing and analyzing data), collection/recycling predicting means (forecasting collection timing and quantities), and production plan setting means (optimizing recycling schedules). This segmentation manages complexity by organizing the comprehensive recycling process into manageable, specialized components that can be implemented and maintained systematically
Solution Approach 2:
The system incorporates information collecting means that capture panel usage status and feed this data back through information processing and prediction modules to the production planning stage. This feedback loop enables dynamic optimization of recycling operations based on actual usage patterns, improving system efficiency while maintaining manageable complexity through data-driven decision making
3Ease of manufacture
If valuable materials (noble metals, rare earth metals, high-purity metals) are recovered from used organic EL panels, then material cost is reduced, but collection and processing infrastructure must be established
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary actions by establishing information collection and prediction capabilities before actual recycling operations begin. The information processing means stores usage data, and the prediction means forecasts collection timing and quantities in advance, allowing the infrastructure to be prepared and optimized before valuable materials need to be recovered, reducing the complexity of establishing collection infrastructure
Data Source
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AI summary
A collecting/ recycling system includes: information collecting section 10 that obtains a status of the organic EL panel used in a market; information processing section 20 that processes and stores, as collection/ recycling information, information about a reutilizable member, part, and material of the organic EL panel; collection/ recycling predicting section 30 that predicts the timing and quantity of the reutilizable member, part, and material of the organic EL panel, whose the status has been obtained by information collecting section 10, to be distributed to a recycling step based on the collection/ recycling information stored in information processing section 20; and production plan setting section 40 that sets a production plan of a recycled organic EL panel using the reutilizable member/part/material based on the timing and quantity predicted by collection/ recycling predicting section 30.