The University of New South Wales School of Materials Science and Engineering has been researching a new way to recycle e-waste using what they term material microsurgery. This microrecycling strategy offers a solution for exploiting e-waste as a materials resource.

“A powder produced by grinding glass and plastic from discarded computer monitors was heated to 2,732º F, yielding silicon carbide nanowires. These were subsequently mixed with ground-up circuit boards, placed on a steel substrate and heated to 1,832º F to melt the copper in the circuit board particles, forming an enriched copper-silicon carbide hybrid layer that bonded to the steel's surface as a protective coating,” Engineering 360 explained.

New surface coatings are derived from ground and thermally processed computer monitors, circuit boards and other electronic waste. Source: Rumana Hossain et al.

Thorough testing showed “the addition of the hybrid layer was determined to increase the surface hardness by ∼125% compared to the base steel”. No major cracks, holes or flaking were found when tested.

This new process would greatly decrease the dumping of e-waste to landfills which can cause issues and provide value-added coatings for other electronic components.

As ACS Omega explains, the process for recycling e-waste differs from other recycling methods, as most recycled materials are used to make similar products that are being recycled. Glass and plastic are generally to produce more glass and plastics. 

“However, complex waste streams such as electronic waste (e-waste) are composed of a variety of materials, which are difficult to transform into their original form. Glass, metals, and plastics are embedded in e-waste in such a manner that it is not feasible to separate them and remove contamination for conventional recycling. Conventional recycling also requires a large input volume of like materials, which is not possible to obtain from many e-waste sources such as printed circuit boards (PCBs)”.

Microrecycling uses selective thermal transformation methods to extract e-waste metals, ceramics and polymers. Given the increasing issue of e-waste, methods to address the issue are needed.