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E-Waste Mining Could Be Big Business (bbc.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the BBC: Professor Veena Sahajwalla's mine in Australia produces gold, silver and copper -- and there isn't a pick-axe in sight. Her "urban mine" at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) is extracting these materials not from rock, but from electronic gadgets. The Sydney-based expert in materials science reckons her operation will become efficient enough to be making a profit within a couple of years. "Economic modeling shows the cost of around $500,000 Australian dollars for a micro-factory pays off in two to three years, and can generate revenue and create jobs," she says. "That means there are environmental, social and economic benefits." In fact, research indicates that such facilities can actually be far more profitable than traditional mining.
According to a study published recently in the journal Environmental Science & Technology, a typical cathode-ray tube TV contains about 450g of copper and 227g of aluminum, as well as around 5.6g of gold. While a gold mine can generate five or six grammes of the metal per tonne of raw material, that figure rises to as much as 350g per tonne when the source is discarded electronics. The figures emerged in a joint study from Beijing's Tsinghua University and Macquarie University, in Sydney, where academics examined data from eight recycling companies in China to work out the cost for extracting these metals from electronic waste.
According to a study published recently in the journal Environmental Science & Technology, a typical cathode-ray tube TV contains about 450g of copper and 227g of aluminum, as well as around 5.6g of gold. While a gold mine can generate five or six grammes of the metal per tonne of raw material, that figure rises to as much as 350g per tonne when the source is discarded electronics. The figures emerged in a joint study from Beijing's Tsinghua University and Macquarie University, in Sydney, where academics examined data from eight recycling companies in China to work out the cost for extracting these metals from electronic waste.
Actually, gold mines have horrendous byproducts due to the post processing of mined material. That says nothing about the effects of dredging streams, honeycombing mountains for veins, etc.
because recycling the old steel is more profitable. To be fair we also don't build infrastructure anymore (thanks to 40 years of non-stop tax cuts) so we don't need very much of it.
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Canada and the UK did the same with recycling old paper. Paper mills went out of business due to lack of demand and even the price of waste paper fell because there was so much of it.
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What? Fucktons of horrible byproducts get generated depending upon the method of extraction and refining of gold. Ever hear of mercury amalgamation or cyanide leaching? Nitric acid processing? Do you even mine and extract gold? I do, but only as a by-product of hunting down gemstone material. If it's not in native form and large enough to bother with without the need for chemical (excepting dihydrogen monoxide) or fire to extract, I'm on it, but otherwise some other fool can have fun with the tailings and poisoning the environment.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Most electronics recycling companies are junking the plastics, and only recycling what's on the boards or other components, then junking the boards and component remnants as well.
They're not giving a shit about the plastics, since that's not what they're after. They want that gold, copper, silver, aluminum, iridium, platinum, and such.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
That's $200 in gold TODAY. Not when the TV's were manufactured or disposed of. When's the last time a CRT rolled off the production lines?
Hell, in the 80's, gold was around $200/ounce, that pulls the price per gram down to around $6. The 50's, 60's, 70's... Gold was even cheaper.. And TV's were fucking EXPENSIVE.
Of course, you're too busy being an ass to think about that.. Well, either that or you are twelve...