First European database of valuable e-waste created

New Delhi, Jan 17 : Expert organisations have joined hands to create the first European database of valuable materials available for "urban mining" from scrap vehicles, spent batteries, electronic waste, discarded electrical equipment and mining waste, it was announced on Wednesday.

A smartphone contains around 40 different critical raw materials, with a concentration of gold 25 to 30 times that of the richest primary gold ores.

The Urban Mine Platform, created by 17 partners in project ProSUM (Prospecting Secondary Raw Materials in the Urban Mine and Mining Wastes), presents the flows of precious and base metals and critical raw materials in products in use and throughout their journey to end of life.

The database reveals the amount of valuable materials recovered or lost in the EU's scrap vehicles, batteries, computers, phones, gadgets, appliances and other high tech products discarded annually -- roughly 18 million tonnes in all -- the weight of three million African elephants.

The EU, Norway and Switzerland generated around 10.5 million tonnes of waste electrical and electronic equipment in 2016, about 23 per cent of the world total.

In addition, two million tonnes of batteries and some seven to eight million tonnes of EU vehicles reach their end-of-life annually.

All represent a rich source of secondary critical raw materials.

The recently published Global e-Waste Monitor reported the world's 44.7 metric tonnes of e-waste alone, not including vehicles, in 2016, contained 55 billion Euros worth of precious metals and other high value materials.

The Urban Mine Platform contains data for elements and materials in high abundance in these waste products, mainly base metals, precious metals and critical raw materials.

The ProSUM consortium says "urban mining" to recover valuable critical raw materials from wastes is vital for securing ongoing supplies for manufacturing and limit dependence on non-EU suppliers.

To that end, the project partners created from over 800 source documents and databases "a state-of-the-art knowledge base, using best available data in a harmonised and updateable format, which allows the recycling industry and policymakers to make more informed investment and policy decisions to increase the supply and recycling of secondary raw materials".

It contains "all readily available data on market inputs, stocks in use and hibernated, compositions and waste flows of electrical and electronic equipment, vehicles and batteries for all EU 28 member states plus Switzerland and Norway".

Pascal Leroy, Secretary General of the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Forum, a Brussels-based not-for-profit association and ProSUM project coordinator, said: "Three years in the making, this consolidated database is the world's first 'one stop shop' knowledge data platform on CRMs (critical raw materials) in waste products."

Its report notes that mining discarded high tech products produce 80 per cent less carbon dioxide emissions per unit of gold compared to primary mining operations.

With respect to batteries, the report points to a sharp jump in the European Union, Switzerland and Norway since year 2000, with 2.7 million tonnes expected to be put on the market in 2020, up from roughly 1.7 million tonnes in 2000.

Europe's end of life vehicles represent a large source of secondary base metals like steel (213 million tonnes), aluminium (24 million tonnes) and copper (7.3 million tonnes), as well as platinum and palladium used in car catalysts.

Increasingly, vehicles also contain large amounts of critical raw materials due to electronics, as well as alloying elements used in steel, aluminium and magnesium.