Environmentally Benign Solution for Recycling Electronic Waste Using the Principles of Green Chemistry

Abstract

In electronic waste recycling industry, printed wire boards (PWBs)/integrated chips (ICs) recycling is one of the most challenge tasks due to the fact that PWBs/ICs are diverse and complex in terms of materials and components makeup,as well as the original equipment manufacturing processes. In this paper, we will present environmental benign solution to recover valuable metals from PWB and integrated circuit chips (ICs) dissembled from waste PWB, based on green chemistry methodologies. We will demonstrate that the process/chemistry can selectively separate and recover precious metals from base metals. The 95%-99% recovery rate of precious metals can be achieved from the recycling of PWB and integrated circuit chips.