News Fujitsu Launches Biodegradable Mouse

Fujitsu has launched the M440 ECO Mouse; a biodegradable PC peripheral.

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/hardware/2011/01/25/fujitsu-biodegradable-mouse/1

 

How do they define biodegradeable? I've never understood this. Recyclable, ok, but I can't see us putting our used electronics in the composter somehow.

All else aside, the other mice that visit the composter might get jealous...

 

If it is truly biodegradeable, can I bury this then and leave it there, safe in the knowledge that NOTHING is hurting nature?

Recyclable, sure. Biodegradeable? Pics or it didn't happen tbh.

 

So, how long can you leave it on your desk before it turns to sludge?
Does it degrade quickly after a certain point i.e. fine for 5 years then bam it's all 'earthy' and needs to be composted. Is it a slow process where it slowly falls apart giving you months of flaky use?

 

The mouse will just break apart naturally after some years, most likely while on a landfill site.
If you use the newish tesco bags you will be familiar with it also. If you wrap something in a tesco bag and put it away for storage, when you come back to it about a month later, the bag will be falling to bits.

It all depends how long you expect your mouse and keyboard to last. my MX518 has lasted for years, along with my G15 keyboard. It may be cheaper to make those biodegradable ones in a 1 on 1 comparison, but how many sets of those would I have to use for them to last as long as my logitech ones?

 

I'm still waiting for the edible kind.

 

I suspect that only the shell is biodegradable, while the electronics inside are still as harmful as ever. Like the posters above, I am inclined to say that we would be better off making our tech recyclable rather than biodegradable.

 

Your cat has the edible kind.

 

I am sure the "biodegradable" and fully recyclable part means that the electronic bits can be recycled and then the shell can be chucked to biodegrade.

Depending on the properties it is probably either only biodegradable in water, or with UV. My wife's Yoga mat is that way, UV light will begin breaking it down. Safe to use outside a bit, but a few weeks of constant sun is going to make it start to fall apart. A lot of vegetable based platic alternatives will only begin biodegrading if exposed to water (such as in a landfill), and it isn't immediate.

 

Wow, that's pretty far out. I wonder if sweaty palms make it degrade sooner.

 

what i want to know is if this mouse is really biodegradable, wouldn't that mean after many years of use it'll start to physically degrade? i wouldn't want to take my hand off my mouse to find arboform residue on my hand

 

I'll ask my cat to save you one!

 

There are palms out there so sweaty that this wouldn't last 5 minutes under.

 

So how long does it take to "degrade" then?
10, 20, 50 100+ years?

 

Considerably less long than plastic.

 

Though it's a novel concept, that's damn expensive for a basic mouse. You can get a MS Mouse for like, $4.

 

Good to see one manufacturer making a planet conscious environmentally friendly effort, I wonder how long long they will do it with other products of theres.

We could do with more products making use of Arbofoam and Biograde, like keyboards and gamepads, consoles, headsets, cases and enclosures of all descriptions, printers and to other household things like cooking utensils, smoke alarms, tv's and so the list goes on.

Hopefully other manufacturers will take this example and follow suit.

 

I think I could biodegrade this all by myself:




The next big thing... edible motherboards..

 

I would
+rep

 

I think the point is that the would-be-plastic parts are now biodegradable (whereas in the past, these pieces would just sit in a landfill for ages). The electronic parts are the same, but they are recyclable--so essentially, the impact of this mouse on nature is minimal. The whole thing obvious isn't biodegradable, as the article indicates.

@Ph4lanx: If you do a google search, you'll quickly find Arbofoam degrades into the same constituent parts as wood since Arbofoam is made of lignin (a waste product from paper manufacturing and an entirely natural component of wood). This probably tells me Arbofoam will last a pretty long time unless exposed to less-than-normal circumstances such as extreme humidity.

I couldn't find much on Biograde except that, unlike Arbofoam's lignin, Biograde is based on natural resins. In both cases, Biograde and Arbofoam are non-toxic, non-polluting, fully biodegradable, and yes.. if you leave parts made from Biograde or Arbofoam in the ground, it won't hurt nature at all.

Just make sure to recycle the inside bits! But that should be completely obvious... right?