The medals for the 2010 Winter Olympics will contain metal salvaged from old printed circuit boards.
In a strange parallel to the inevitable future where robots wear the remains of humans as grisly trophies, the medals for the Winter Olympics in Vancouver next year will contain material reclaimed from old printed circuit boards, or PCBs.
The various metals that go up to making the weighty medals – each one weighing around 1lb – 1.5lb – have been harvested from PCBs where it otherwise have just been landfill, possibly even from the casualties of the secret robots wars of the 70s.
The medals already break from tradition, featuring work by Canadian artists Corrine Hunt and Omer Arbel, and are laser-etched with unique designs so that no two medals are exactly alike.
While a few pounds of metal, isn’t going to make a huge dent in the problem of electronic waste, it’s nice to see an organization – albeit an unexpected one like the Olympic commission – taking an interest.
