Hi Guillaume,

When looking at the overall lifecycle footprint (including all environmental criteria, not only C02) the efficiency is the most important indeed, especially for good motors (no failure, so long working time). But I think we should definitely think more about designs that ease recycling (how to easily dismount the motor, reuse all active materials) especially for massively produced electric motors (automotive, house appliances). A real ecofriendly design process should account for cost (energy+time) of dismounting, separating of metals used in electronics, etc. It requires a system level design approach combining converter + e-motor + control aspects - a great research topic for severals PhDs!

LSEE has already worked in that direction with their green motor project, there is still a lot to do: http://www.pole-medee.com/2017/12/the-green-motor-project/

In that kind of mulitobjective approach all criteria can't be satisfied (ex: high efficiency means PM so rare-earth dependency) so an application must be fixed as well as a bias for action. For sustainable mobility I imagine a synchronous reluctance motor with organic insulation, where copper coils can be easily removed to rewind the motor after insulation wear or to be able to recycle copper.

As you know we are building the open-source PYLEECAN project (www.pyleecan.org) which aims are providing the first fully open-source simulation software for the design optimization of electrical machines and drives under Python. I hope such a tool can boost ecodesign of electrical machines by helping motor designers to access to free advanced design tools (as commercial electromagnetic design software cannot be afforded by all emotor designers). There already exists open source library for LCA calculations in Python, so coupling PYLEECAN with those LCA tools would provided a good way to rank different topologies in term of enviromental impacts. PYLEECAN is also a great framework to improve research in electromagnetic loss modelling, providing reproducible calculation cases and open-source algorithms.

One possibility is to use bearing-less machines. Its basic principles and advances can be found in many references including the following.

H. Rezaei and S. Vaez-Zadeh," Modelling and analysis of permanent magnet electrodynamic suspension systems," Progress In Electromagnetics Research M, Vol. 36, 77-84, 2014.

Hi Sadegh,

I am well aware of bearingless technology. However, to my knowledge, it requires a much more complex electronic system than for a traditionnal motor, and sometimes additional coils (that can also change the torque/motor constants in a good way but are not necessary). You need additional sensors for rotor positionning and associated electronics, which impacts efficiency. What is your opinion about that? Do you think it be a lower footprint as compared to a bushing at low speed or bearings for high speed? Small high speed bearings have small parts, which have smaller impact than additional copper (see reports in my question).

Thanks for you comments,

Guillaume

Hi,

You probably know that by designing a PM type electrodynamic suspension bearing, you may be able to have one with no coil and control and supply.

Your idea seems attractive. Expected more people like it and comment. Any improvement in the idea?

I was expecting more comments too! No progress for now but I keep reading and trying to find new ideas! Thanks for asking.

Hi Guillaume,

When looking at the overall lifecycle footprint (including all environmental criteria, not only C02) the efficiency is the most important indeed, especially for good motors (no failure, so long working time). But I think we should definitely think more about designs that ease recycling (how to easily dismount the motor, reuse all active materials) especially for massively produced electric motors (automotive, house appliances). A real ecofriendly design process should account for cost (energy+time) of dismounting, separating of metals used in electronics, etc. It requires a system level design approach combining converter + e-motor + control aspects - a great research topic for severals PhDs!

LSEE has already worked in that direction with their green motor project, there is still a lot to do: http://www.pole-medee.com/2017/12/the-green-motor-project/

In that kind of mulitobjective approach all criteria can't be satisfied (ex: high efficiency means PM so rare-earth dependency) so an application must be fixed as well as a bias for action. For sustainable mobility I imagine a synchronous reluctance motor with organic insulation, where copper coils can be easily removed to rewind the motor after insulation wear or to be able to recycle copper.

As you know we are building the open-source PYLEECAN project (www.pyleecan.org) which aims are providing the first fully open-source simulation software for the design optimization of electrical machines and drives under Python. I hope such a tool can boost ecodesign of electrical machines by helping motor designers to access to free advanced design tools (as commercial electromagnetic design software cannot be afforded by all emotor designers). There already exists open source library for LCA calculations in Python, so coupling PYLEECAN with those LCA tools would provided a good way to rank different topologies in term of enviromental impacts. PYLEECAN is also a great framework to improve research in electromagnetic loss modelling, providing reproducible calculation cases and open-source algorithms.

Here is a European project between KU Leuven and Valeo:

"DEMETER e-motor, the first recyclable e-motor (for a hybrid electric vehicle) based on recycled NdFeB magnets."

https://etn-demeter.eu/new-video-first-recyclable-e-motor/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jBB0w3g70co

Hello Leo,

When you mention "4.2k", you mean 4.2 Kelvin and operating as a superconductor right? How would you manage to reach such temperature in an ecological way?

Hi Guillaume,

Regarding the impact of the manufacture process on the ecological footprint, I think that synchronous reluctance and induction machines would be the best. Because, i know that producing magnets have several bad effects on the environnement.

However, as PM machines are more efficient than other electrical machines, it might be that this advantage will be a leading parameter with respect to the ecological footprint