Only a few miles south of Augusta in the US state of Georgia, one of the most advanced endeavors in the circular economy is taking shape: the multi-metal recycling plant for Aurubis. The plant, which is being supplied by SMS, will be able to recycle up to 180,000 t of recycling materials every year, following the conclusion of the two building phases. The Aurubis plant will be the first recycling facility for these kinds of materials in the US and is primarily designed to recover metals from electronic waste.
Huge economic potential
The digital transformation has changed and continues to alter the way we live, work, learn, socialize, and do business. Electronic devices play a central role as they interconnect people, applications, and machines. This trend extends beyond computers and mobile phones to include smart appliances, e-bikes, e-scooters, health monitors, sensors, smart furniture, wearable tech, toys, tools, and devices like LEDs and solar panels, to name but a few.
Electronic waste is the downside of this development as all of these products come to the end of their useful life when they are replaced by rapid innovations. This results in fast-growing amounts of waste electronic and electrical equipment, or WEEE for short. In 2022, the world generated 62 million tons of e-waste, an average of 7.8 kg per capita. The composition varies by type of equipment, but e-waste consists primarily of metals and alloys (50% to 60%), plastics (25%), as well as composite materials, glass, and concrete. Among the metals, steel is the most used, followed by aluminum and copper, although WEEE also contains notable amounts of zinc, lead, tin, cobalt, antimony, gold, silver, and palladium, as well as platinum group metals. Much more impressive than the mere quantities are the associated values. The Global E-waste Monitor estimates that e-waste contains 19 billion US dollars’ worth of copper, 15 billion in gold, 14 billion in nickel, 8 billion in palladium, and 1.4 billion in tin every year. So, recycling electronic devices should be a no-brainer to transform the inevitable waste created by society using appropriate technology.
However, only a small part of these metals is recovered. The main reason is the low collection rate. Only 22% of this WEEE mass was documented as formally collected and recycled in an environmentally sound manner. The large majority is collected outside formal e-waste management systems, shipped to countries with no developed e-waste management infrastructure, or simply used as landfill. This can have a severe impact on the environment and people’s health as WEEE contains harmful materials.
E-waste recycling technology
When properly collected, the recycling of WEEE remains a complex metallurgical challenge. The complexity arises from the diverse and functional combination of metals and other materials, making recycling and recovery more challenging compared to conventional metal scraps. High recycling rates can only be achieved with a profound understanding of the metallurgical processes in combination with extensive experience in plant engineering. Ideally, digital twins and simulations are used to determine the best process route and the design of the various plants.
Over recent decades, we have developed numerous processes to offer tailored solutions for recycling WEEE, more specifically circuit boards that contain valuable elements. SMS provides pyro- and hydrometallurgical solutions, as well as combinations of both, designed to effectively address the challenges of recycling complex metal-containing waste. Our WEEE recycling solutions range from standalone technologies that produce copper-rich alloys consisting mainly of valuable metals such as copper, cobalt, nickel, gold, silver, platinum, and palladium as an intermediate product, to complex plants producing all relevant metals as well as slag and energy. The larger plant concepts can be complemented with rectangular copper anode refining furnaces, which also allow the recycling of various copper scraps.
The current design offers an annual capacity of 3,000 to 120,000 t of WEEE concentrates. The BlueSmelter and the TBRC are key units for smelting the WEEE scrap. Compared with each other, the BlueSmelter can handle lower-grade WEEE concentrates with higher organic contents, while the TBRC can handle bulky material or higher viscous slags. To establish the most effective recycling processes, SMS offers various technology options and customer-specific process combinations.
The BlueSmelter for WEEE smelting is designed to process a wide range of secondary raw materials containing copper and precious metals, with a focus on low qualities and high organic content but with significant monetary value. The improved bath smelter furnace enables maintenance-free blowing of the media via the patented injectors, which provides better turbulence for rapid reactions in the vessel.
The Aurubis project
The key component of the new multi-metal recycling plant for Aurubis is a top-blown rotary converter (TBRC), used to recover copper, nickel, tin, zinc, precious metals, and platinum group metals from complex recycling materials. This technology also has its origins in the steel industry. Our scope of delivery includes sampling and off-gas cleaning facilities. Aurubis and SMS group have also signed a cooperation agreement, establishing a long-term collaborative partnership.