Gallo: Glass has undergone an amazing evolution. Just look at the latest innovations in smart glasses and interactive glass surfaces. Glass is now bendable and used as protective cover glass in small devices and curved displays. Its resistance to breakage has massively increased due to tailored glass compositions that allow a chemical ion exchange, resulting in huge gains of strength. Windows used to just be a means to provide protection from the elements while still allowing light to come in. But nowadays, glass is used in facades to generate energy or provide privacy at a switch of a button. The semiconductor industry is also being revolutionized with glass circuit boards entering the market to provide more compact, lightweight, and miniaturized devices. Glass is proving to be one of the most versatile and adaptable materials, consistently entering uncharted territory thanks to new and innovative developments.

Gallo: I think there are two sides to this. One is how glass contributes to energy preservation by designing smarter and less energy-consuming or even energy-producing devices. For example, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory achieved fusion ignition in December 2022, which is powered by many glass components that direct and tailor laser beams to such precision that a fusion reaction is possible. With that breakthrough, fusion as a sustainable energy source might become reality. Another exciting area is smart building materials with transparent energy harvesting window solutions now available to the market. Think about what this could do if such windows were implemented in office buildings and commercial or residential window systems.

The other side to this question is related to glass manufacturing itself. While glass components support energy-saving technologies, let’s keep in mind that producing glass requires huge amounts of energy. It is therefore great to see that glass manufacturers around the globe invest in sustainable production and glass recycling. SCHOTT recently succeeded in powering a glass melting tank with hydrogen and has just started a glass ceramic cooktop recycling program.

Gallo: Flat glass requirements increased dramatically over the years and were necessary in order to achieve all the breakthroughs we just discussed. And while developing new compositions is one part of innovation, the other one is providing strong, resilient, large glass sheets in a broad range of thickness and excellent quality, with consistent properties and exceptional flatness. SCHOTT has addressed this by utilizing various flat glass production processes from downdraw manufacturing for ultrathin glasses to micro-floating for very large formats in over 20 different thicknesses. And while producing a flat glass panel with superior flatness is a great beginning, significant value is added during post processing when, for instance, such ultra-thin glasses are structured to be used as interposers or coated as required for many advanced optical or medical end-uses. Each glass composition has its own set of specific properties and there is a lot of know-how in developing functional coatings or high-performance finishes for customized applications.