• Resources Recycling
• /
• v.11 no.6
• /
• pp.3-11
• /
• 2002

Recently, waste printed circuit board (PCB) has significantly increased in its amount due to the rapid development of electronic industries. Since several kinds of noxious materials and also valuable metals are contained in it, the waste PCB is in an urgent need of recycling for the dual purposes for the prevention of environmental pollution and recovery of valuable resources. Also, the catalyst which equipped in the exhaust pipes of automobiles to reduce emission of air pollutants contains precious met-als so that their recovery from the waste auto-catalysts is required. In this study, the recovery of valuable metals from waste PCB and auto-catalyst by arc furnace melting process has been investigated, which is known to be very stable and suitable f3r less production of pollutants due to its high operating temperature. The effect of the kind of flux on the recovery of precious metals was examined by using quicklime, converter slag, and copper slag as the flux. In addition, the influence of direct and alternating current and the applying direction of direct current has been investigated. It was observed that using converter or copper slag as a flux was more desirable for a higher efficiency in the precious metal recovery compared with quicklime. For the effect of current, application of direct current taking the bottom as a negative pole generally showed a better efficiency for the extraction of valuable metals from waste PCB, which was also observed for the case of waste auto-catalyst. The average recovery of precious metals from both wastes by arc furnace melting process was very high, which was up to in the range of 95～97%.

• Membrane Journal
• /
• v.23 no.1
• /
• pp.92-99
• /
• 2013

In this study the nanofiltration (NF) membrane treatment of a sulfuric acid waste solutions containing copper ion ($Cu^{+2}$) discharging from the etching processes of the printed circuit board (PCB) manufacturing industry has been studied for the recycling of acid etching solution. SelRO MPS-34 4040 NF membrane from Koch company was tested to obtain the basic NF data for recycling of etching solution and separation efficiency (total rejection) of copper ion. NF experiments were carried out with a dead-end membrane filtration laboratory system. The pure water flux was increased with the increasing storage time in sulfuric acid solution and lowering pH of acid solution because of the enhancement of NF membrane damage by sulfuric acid. The permeate flux of acid solution was decreased with the increasing copper ion concentration. Total rejection of copper ion was decreased with the increasing storage time in sulfuric acid solution and copper ion concentration, and lowering the pH of acid solution. The total rejection of copper ion was decreased from initial 37% to 15% minimum value.