Making the Modern World: Materials and Dematerialization

the first category of consumer goods that saw an obvious and widespread increase of expenditure was clothing,

men can work steadily at rates between 60 and 80 W, averaging about 1000 g/W

In contrast to thermoplastics, thermoset plastics have bonds among molecules (and hence a greater dimensional stability)

The combustion of fossil fuels generates more than 90% of all anthropogenic sulfur,

in reducing the weight of passenger cars and other vehicles costs 670 GJ/t and carbon-fiber reinforced polymer (polyacrylonitrite) fiber requires just over 700 GJ/t (Das, 2011), more than three times that of aluminum.

domestic consumption of primary metals reached a fluctuating plateau in the late 1960s and the early 1970s, followed by a general decline for the next 30 years that is ascribable to the first wave of deindustrialization of America, that is to the country's loss of global dominance in iron and steelmaking and the declining output of color metals.

Additive manufacturing (three-dimensional printing) offers the least wasteful way to produce complex shapes with minimal waste

this means that paper can be recycled no more than four to seven times.

Synthetic zeolites are thus a perfect example of a relatively obscure but very important material; by 2010 their global output rose to 2.8 Mt