Dell’s Concept Luna Aims To Revolutionize Laptop Designs

Dell is committed to reducing its impact on the environment and through various initiates, plans on rethinking how it operates its business. Great emphasis is being placed on accelerating the circular economy and achieving net zero greenhouse gas emissions. Examples of this include the use of closed-loop aluminum from out of use hard drives, bioplastics from tree waste and reclaimed carbon fiber.

Concept Luna, which is the talk of the town, is a derivation of this ethos. In a nutshell, it’s a laptop that goes against convention. Unlike traditional designs’ “use and dispose” policy, Luna’s purpose is about efficiency and ease of reparability. Dell says it’s a proof-of-concept developed in collaboration with Intel to realize its circular economy goals.

The idea is to make components immediately accessible, replaceable and reusable, thus reducing resource usage and the need to manufacturer more materials. Dell says that Luna is capable of reducing an estimated 50% in overall carbon footprint.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

This is how it’s achieved:

Shrinking the total area of the motherboard by 75% and reducing component count by 20%. This in turn can help reduce the motherboard’s carbon footprint by 50%.

• The smaller motherboard is relocated to the chassis’ top cover to expose a larger area for cooling. This coupled with separating the battery charging unit in the base, leads to better passive heat distribution, which may negate the need for a physical fan.
• The use of a smaller battery with advanced deep-cycle cells. They can maintain overall capacity over many years of use, meaning they can be refurbished or reused far longer than conventional laptop batteries.
• Aluminum chassis processed using hydro power and using a stamped aluminum construction requires less energy and produces minimal scrap.
• The biobased printed circuit board (PCB) is made from flax fiber in the base and water-soluble polymer as the glue. Flax fiber replaces traditional plastic laminates and since its water-soluble, eases the burden of separating metals and components from the board during recycling.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

For ease of repairability, this is how Luna is constructed:

Total number of screws has been reduced by 10 times. Only four screws need to be removed to access the internal components. Dell suggests that this will save about 1.5 hours in overall repair time or 16 times faster than traditional laptops.

Palm rest assembly designed for ease of repair. Keyboard mechanism can be easily separated from other components to simplify recycling.

• Components and casing are built around a modular theme, enabling easier assembly and disassembly.

https://youtu.be/WCcYsJREtjU

Dell says that Concept Luna’s purpose is to serve as a feasibility study into the possible ways to reduce the company’s overall carbon footprint. It’s possible that Luna may never see the light of day but pave the way for future designs that are far more environmentally friendly and easier to dissemble or repair.