Viviane Tavares de Moraes

Recycling of WEEE: Characterization of spent printed circuit boards from mobile phones and computers

This paper presents a comparison between printed circuit boards from computers and mobile phones. Since printed circuits boards are becoming more complex and smaller, the amount of materials is constantly changing. The main objective of this work was to characterize spent printed circuit boards from computers and mobile phones applying mineral processing technique to separate the metal, ceramic, and polymer fractions. The processing was performed by comminution in a hammer mill, followed by particle size analysis, and by magnetic and electrostatic separation. Aqua regia leaching, loss-on-ignition and chemical analysis (inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectroscopy - ICP-OES) were carried out to determine the composition of printed circuit boards and the metal rich fraction. The composition of the studied mobile phones printed circuit boards (PCB-MP) was 63 wt.% metals; 24 wt.% ceramics and 13 wt.% polymers; and of the printed circuit boards from studied personal computers (PCB-PC) was 45 wt.% metals; 27 wt.% polymers and ceramics 28 wt.% ceramics. The chemical analysis showed that copper concentration in printed circuit boards from personal computers was 20 wt.% and in printed circuit boards from mobile phones was 34.5 wt.%. According to the characteristics of each type of printed circuit board, the recovery of precious metals may be the main goal of the recycling process of printed circuit boards from personal computers and the recovery of copper should be the main goal of the recycling process of printed circuit boards from mobile phones. Hence, these printed circuit boards would not be mixed prior treatment. The results of this paper show that copper concentration is increasing in mobile phones and remaining constant in personal computers.

Printed circuit board recycling: Physical processing and copper extraction by selective leaching

Global generation of waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) is about 40 million tons per year. Constant increase in WEEE generation added to international legislations has improved the development of processes for materials recovery and sustainability of electrical and electronic industry. This paper describes a new hydrometallurgical route (leaching process) to recycle printed circuit boards (PCBs) from printers to recover copper. Methodology included PCBs characterization and a combined route of physical and hydrometallurgical processing. Magnetic separation, acid digestion and chemical analysis by ICP-OES were performed. On leaching process were used two stages: the first one in a sulfuric media and the second in an oxidant media. The results showed that the PCBs composition was 74.6 wt.% of non-magnetic material and 25.4 wt.% of magnetic one. The metallic fraction corresponded to 44.0 wt.%, the polymeric to 28.5 wt.% and the ceramic to 27.5 wt.%. The main metal was copper and its initial content was 32.5 wt.%. On sulfuric leaching 90 wt.% of Al, 40 wt.% of Zn and 8.6 wt.% of Sn were extracted, whereas on oxidant leaching tests the extraction percentage of Cu was 100 wt.%, of Zn 60 wt.% and of Al 10 wt.%. At the end of the hydrometallurgical processing was obtained 100% of copper extraction and the recovery factor was 98.46%, which corresponds to a 32 kg of Cu in 100 kg of PCB.

CARACTERIZAÇÃO DE PLACAS DE MEMÓRIA DE COMPUTADORES OBSOLETOS VISANDO A RECUPERAÇAO DE PRATA POR MEIO DE NANOPARTÍCULAS

Marcos Paulo Kohler Caldas Mariana Alves de Carvalho 2 Viviane Tavares de Moraes 3 Jorge Alberto Soares Tenório 4 Denise Crocce Romano Espinosa 5 Resumo A combinação do elevado volume gerado de resíduos de equipamentos eletroeletrônicos (REEE) com o aumento da obsolescência programada faz com que haja a necessidade de se pensar em alternativas para a disposição destes resíduos sem impacto ao meio ambiente e à saúde humana, como a reciclagem com posterior recuperação de metais. Para isso, é necessário conhecer a natureza dos materiais constituintes do resíduo. A Placa de Circuito Impresso (PCI) é um importante representante dos REEE, pois está presente em grande parte dos equipamentos eletrônicos, como nos computadores. Sua composição heterogênea possui um alto teor de metais, alguns deles preciosos, que representam quase a totalidade do valor intrínseco da placa, justificando a importância da reciclagem para recuperação dos mesmos. No presente trabalho foi realizada a caracterização de uma placa de memória de computadores obsoletos para a posterior recuperação dos metais preciosos nela contidos na forma de nanopartículas. Conclui-se que a placa de memória possui 18,9% de metais, 48,4% de cerâmicas e 32,7% de polímeros em massa. Dentre os metais o Cu é o que aparece de forma mais expressiva, constituindo 13,83% em massa da placa. Os metais preciosos Ag e Au constituem 0,053% e 0,069% em massa, respectivamente, porém seu alto valor de mercado justifica a viabilidade de sua recuperação. Palavras-chave: Reciclagem; Caracterização; Nanopartículas; Metais preciosos.