Hitting the triple bottom line drives sustainable design

By Philip Ling   |   December 6, 2023

STMicroelectronics was an early proponent of the triple bottom line, and its goal is to become carbon neutral.

Sustainability at a corporate level continues to gain attention. Commercial success comes with social responsibility, something referred to in business as the triple bottom line and represented by the three Ps: profit, people and planet.

STMicroelectronics published its Environmental Decalogue in 1995, so it has been on this journey for nearly three decades. Sharing its experience and its plans with Avnet, ST leaders explained that ST published its first corporate environmental report in 1998 with the tagline, “The world is priceless, ecology is free.”

Recognizing that its responsibilities were not only to shareholders but to the wider community, ST was an early proponent of the triple bottom line, and its goal is to become carbon neutral. In 2020, ST announced its strong commitment to being carbon neutral by 2027. To map this journey, ST published its sustainability charter, which has 24 sustainability goals taking it from 2021 to 2027. 

Over the years, ST has shown how sustainability can also be good business practice and increase competitiveness. The practices ST now follows align with the major long-term trends moving all of society toward a more sustainable future. These trends are smart mobility, renewable energy and energy efficiency, and digitization.

Building a sustainable business

ST launched its Sustainable Technology program in 2011. This global approach puts sustainability at every stage of the product lifecycle. Today, sustainability is at the core of ST’s new product development activities.  

This holistic approach includes building a responsible supply chain and minimizing the impact of its manufacturing activities on the environment and people. This extends to creating market segments that help tackle environmental, social and societal challenges.  

ST is a member of the Responsible Minerals Initiative (RMI), and its Responsible Supply Chain program is based on the Responsible Business Alliance (RBA) methodology. As part of the RMI, ST guarantees that all the tantalum, tin, tungsten and gold it uses is responsibly sourced. ST also monitors its cobalt supply chain.  

ST’s suppliers are required to follow its list of environmental health and safety (EHS)-regulated substances. This list contains more than 3,000 substances and their handling is covered by EHS and International Organization for Standardization (ISO) certificates. 

What is a responsible product? 

ST has an eco-design approach to new product development. This means considering the environmental impact a new product will have, assessing that impact and using that assessment to drive business decisions.  

This involves taking low-level design approaches, such as replacing the gold in the chip with copper or designing the chip to have fewer metal layers. These are the kinds of designs for manufacturing optimization at the chip level that can have a significant environmental impact at the component level. ST’s product development teams have identified two main achievements through its rigorous eco-design process.

• Low carbon products: By reducing the number of manufacturing steps required to fabricate an integrated semiconductor, the carbon footprint for manufacturing each device is reduced. This reduction can be seen at each stage in the supply chain.  
• Power efficiency: By designing integrated devices that are more power efficient, the end products they enable also have greater energy efficiency.  

Every new product goes through the eco-design process, and ST’s ambition is for at least 50% of new products to meet its Sustainability Technology criteria, which ensures a responsible approach throughout the product’s lifecycle.  

Electronic component manufacturers are not directly affected by legislation such as the EU’s Waste of Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive. However, ST’s ECOPACK program reduces the use of hazardous substances in its products and provides a Materials Declaration sheet. This supports recycling of ST’s products at lifecycle end. 

Choosing sustainable components 

Designing with low carbon and energy-efficient components starts with Avnet’s access to ST’s sustainable catalog. Choosing these components helps OEMs comply with environmental regulations such as RoHS (Restriction of Hazardous Substances) and other global or regional directives. More importantly, it supports the production of planet-friendly and human-centric applications.  

Selecting the most planet-friendly components enables our mutual customers to develop greener products that are more competitive in a global marketplace. With a human-centric approach to new product development, ST is also supporting OEMs to address contemporary challenges with innovative and sustainable solutions.  

To help OEMs select sustainable components, ST has developed its sustainable technology label initiative. These flagship responsible products are labeled based on its global processes. These processes include product compliance, eco-design and market assessment to identify responsible applications. The result is a label to identify and promote ST’s responsible products.  

Here are just some examples of ST’s responsible products that feature its Sustainable Technology label. 

• BlueNRG-LP: A programmable Bluetooth LE 5.2 wireless system-on-chip (Soc) that integrates an Arm Cortex-M0 for application code, a high-efficiency DC-DC converter, and an analog-digital converter for reading external sensors and to read the integrated battery voltage sensor. Sustainable benefits include a longer battery lifetime in BLE applications.   
• SCT040HU65G3AG: This is an automotive-grade 650 V 30 A silicon carbide power MOSFET in an HU3PAK package. Sustainable benefits include better efficiency.  
• ISM330: This is a six-axis IMU (inertial measurement unit) with an always-on three-axis accelerometer and three-axis gyroscope with ISPU (intelligent sensor processing unit). Sustainable benefits include ultra-low power operation.  
• STUSB4500: This is a standalone USB PD controller for power-sinking devices. Sustainable benefits include zero power consumption when the port is unplugged and a drastic reduction in the number of AC adapters needed.  
• STM32U5: ST’s flagship ultra-low-power MCU with advanced performance and security includes the sustainability benefits of higher efficiency due to less power consumption. 
• MASTERGAN Series: The MASTERGAN series is an advanced power system-in-package integrating a gate driver and two enhancement mode GaN transistors in a half-bridge configuration. Sustainability benefits include higher integration and power density, which enables smaller and lighter power supplies.   

The path to sustainable living

As our digital magazine What’s Next highlights, sustainability is becoming more important throughout the supply chain. Every player in the global marketplace should accept its responsibilities to promote a more sustainable approach to developing, using and disposing of all products, particularly those enabled by the semiconductor industry.  

The journey to a carbon-neutral society will require widespread change. Adapting to those changes will only be possible through collaboration with partners who understand the challenges and are prepared to overcome them.  

With its sustained commitment to carbon neutrality, ST stands out as an example of what is achievable through responsible engineering and adherence to the triple bottom line.  

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Philip Ling

Philip Ling is a senior technology writer with Avnet. He holds a post-graduate diploma in Advanced M...

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