Abstract
The digestion of neodymium (NdFeB) magnets was investigated in the context of recycling rare earth elements (i.e., Nd, Pr, Dy, and Tb). Among more conventional digestion techniques (microwave digestion, open vessel digestion, and alkaline fusion), focused infrared digestion (FID) was tested as a possible approach to rapidly and efficiently solubilize NdFeB magnets. FID parameters were initially optimized with unmagnetized magnet powder and subsequently used on magnet pieces, demonstrating that the demagnetization and grinding steps are optional.
Highlights
As electronic devices play an increasingly more important role in our lives, society needs to develop strategies to recover valuable metals from end-of-life electronic products.This need is driven by critical metal supply concerns, and by environmental issues with the rapid generation of electronic waste (e-waste) worldwide [1]
The first sample, for method comparison and optimization, was prepared from magnets obtained from hard disk drives (HDD) collected in electronic waste bins located on the main campus at Laval University (Quebec City, QC, Canada) and separated from their brackets
The results obtained in this study indicate that focused infrared digestion (FID) could
Summary
As electronic devices play an increasingly more important role in our lives, society needs to develop strategies to recover valuable metals from end-of-life electronic products. Most separation techniques for REEs require the dissolution of solid matrices, and NdFeB magnets are no exception Digestion of such magnets in a rapid, efficient, and cost-effective manner is an important aspect of a REEs recycling strategy. They reported excellent recoveries and reproducibilities for REEs in various certified reference materials such as OREAS-465 (carbonatite supergene REE-Nb ore), OKA-2 (rare earths and thorium ore), and REE-1 (rare earths, zirconium, and niobium ore) These results suggest that FIR digestion could be a potential alternative to other heat sources for magnet dissolution and, potentially, alleviate previously mentioned sample pretreatments
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