A material is only truly sustainable if it functions over the long term
At Germany's Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing, scientists are asking a question that cuts to the heart of the energy transition: what good is a brilliant material if it cannot endure the world it is meant to serve? Tilmann Hickel and colleagues argue that decades of chasing peak laboratory performance have left a quiet vulnerability in the foundations of clean energy infrastructure — a dependency on rare, geopolitically fragile elements that degrade, resist recycling, and may one day simply run short. Their proposal is not a revolution but a reorientation: build durability, repairability, and chemical resilience into materials from the first design decision, not the last.
- The energy transition rests on materials — batteries, turbine components, hydrogen systems — that are quietly fragile, dependent on rare elements sourced from unstable corners of the global supply chain.
- Laboratory benchmarks have long driven materials research, but real-world conditions expose a gap: components corrode, degrade, and fail in ways that controlled testing never anticipates.
- Three design strategies — substituting scarce elements, deliberately engineering structural defects for stability, and broadening chemical diversity — offer a path to high performance without geopolitical vulnerability.
- Offshore wind turbines must endure salt spray and mechanical stress for decades; batteries must survive thousands of cycles — and the materials enabling this must be designed for that reality from the outset, not retrofitted to it.
- The field now faces a choice: continue optimizing for peak performance as a primary metric, or accept durability, repairability, and supply-chain resilience as equal design constraints.
A materials scientist at Germany's Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing begins with a quiet observation: we have become extraordinarily skilled at making things perform brilliantly under controlled conditions. The problem is that the real world is not a laboratory.
Tilmann Hickel and colleagues at BAM have published a perspective in Current Opinion in Solid State and Materials Science calling for a fundamental reorientation in how high-performance materials are designed. For decades, the field has pursued peak performance — maximum efficiency, strength, or conductivity under ideal test conditions. But batteries degrade over thousands of cycles. Wind turbine components corrode. Hydrogen storage systems lose capacity. And many of these materials depend on rare elements sourced from geopolitically unstable regions, elements that are difficult to recycle once the material fails.
The shift they propose is consequential rather than radical: design for durability first. Build sustainability into the material from the beginning. Consider not how a battery performs in its first cycle, but its thousandth. Ask whether a wind turbine component can be repaired, or whether it will simply become waste when supply chains tighten.
Three concrete strategies anchor their argument. The first is substitution — replacing scarce or sensitive elements with more abundant alternatives without sacrificing core function. The second is defect engineering, a counterintuitive approach in which researchers deliberately introduce structural irregularities — grain boundaries, nanostructures — to improve real-world stability. The third is managing chemical diversity: drawing from a wider palette of elements to create materials that are more robust and capable of meeting multiple demands simultaneously.
Co-author Andrea Stucchi de Camargo frames the stakes plainly: success in the energy transition will not be measured by laboratory results, but by whether materials function reliably in the field for years, whether they can be repaired when they fail, and whether they hold up as raw material availability fluctuates. These are not afterthoughts — they are design constraints that must shape a material from its earliest conception. The BAM team points to existing examples where this approach has already resolved trade-offs once accepted as inevitable. The question now is whether the broader field will follow.
A materials scientist at Germany's Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing sits down with a simple observation: we have become very good at making things perform brilliantly in controlled conditions. The problem is that the real world is not a laboratory.
Tilmann Hickel and his colleagues at BAM have published a perspective in Current Opinion in Solid State and Materials Science arguing for a fundamental reorientation in how researchers design the high-performance materials that will power the energy transition. For decades, the field has chased peak performance—squeezing maximum efficiency, strength, or conductivity out of a material under ideal test conditions. But batteries degrade. Wind turbine components corrode. Hydrogen storage systems lose capacity. And many of these materials rely on rare elements sourced from geopolitically unstable regions, elements that are difficult or impossible to recycle once the material fails.
The shift Hickel and his team propose is not radical, but it is consequential: design for durability first. Build sustainability into the material from the beginning, not as an afterthought. Consider how a battery will perform not in its first cycle but in its thousandth. Ask whether a wind turbine component can be repaired, or whether it will become waste. Think about what happens when supply chains for critical raw materials tighten or break.
They outline three concrete strategies. The first is substitution—deliberately replacing scarce or geopolitically sensitive elements with more abundant alternatives, without sacrificing the material's core function. The second is defect engineering, a counterintuitive approach in which researchers deliberately introduce and control irregularities in a material's structure—grain boundaries, nanostructures—to improve its stability and performance under real-world stress. The third is what they call managing diversity: instead of building materials from a narrow palette of chemical elements, combine a wider variety to create materials that are more robust and can meet multiple demands at once.
The energy transition makes this urgent. Modern high-strength steels used in offshore wind turbines must withstand enormous mechanical forces over decades while remaining light enough to be economical. These materials are chemically complex, which has historically made them difficult to recycle. But that complexity, managed deliberately, can also make them more durable and more resistant to the kinds of degradation that occurs in salt spray and constant flexing. The same logic applies to battery materials, hydrogen storage systems, and catalysts for chemical processes.
Andrea Stucchi de Camargo, a co-author of the paper, frames the challenge plainly: success in the energy transition will not be measured by what a material can do in a laboratory under perfect conditions. It will be measured by whether it functions reliably in the field for many years, whether it can be repaired when it fails, and whether it can perform adequately even as the availability of raw materials fluctuates. These are not separate concerns to be addressed after a material is designed. They are design constraints that should shape the material from the start.
The BAM researchers are not working in theory alone. They point to concrete examples across several material classes where this approach has already yielded results: critical elements partially replaced, functionality maintained over extended periods, and traditional trade-offs—between efficiency and durability, for instance—resolved rather than accepted as inevitable. The perspective is both a diagnosis of how materials research has been conducted and a blueprint for how it might change. The question now is whether the field will listen.
Notable Quotes
A material is only truly sustainable if it functions over the long term, even under real-world conditions.— Tilmann Hickel, materials scientist at BAM
The success of the energy transition depends not on whether a material achieves peak performance in the lab, but on whether it functions reliably in practice over many years, is repairable and can be used in the context of fluctuating raw material conditions.— Andrea Stucchi de Camargo, co-author
The Hearth Conversation Another angle on the story
Why does it matter whether a material performs well in the lab if it fails in the field?
Because we've been optimizing for the wrong thing. A battery that delivers peak energy density for three years is worthless if the energy transition needs it to last ten. We've been designing for the test, not for the job.
But doesn't durability require trade-offs? Don't you have to give up some performance to gain stability?
That's what we've always assumed. But the research shows you don't have to. If you design the material's structure deliberately—introduce defects in the right way, combine elements strategically—you can have both. The trick is thinking about it from the beginning, not bolting it on later.
What's the geopolitical angle here?
Many of these high-performance materials depend on rare elements—cobalt, nickel, rare earths—sourced from a handful of countries. When supply tightens or politics shift, entire industries stall. If you can design materials that work with more abundant elements, or that need less of the scarce ones, you're not just being sustainable. You're building resilience.
So this is about recycling?
Partly. But it's bigger than that. A material that lasts longer doesn't need to be recycled as often. A material that can be repaired doesn't become waste. And a material designed to work with multiple elements is easier to recover and reuse those elements from. Durability is the foundation.
Who needs to change their thinking?
Everyone. Materials scientists, engineers designing products, companies sourcing raw materials, policymakers setting standards. Right now the incentives all point toward peak performance in the lab. We need incentives that reward materials that actually work in the real world, year after year.