New Progresses in Efficient, Selective, and Environmentally Friendly Recovery of Valuable Metal from e‐Waste and Industrial Catalysts

Abstract

AbstractRecycling metals from waste materials has become a major approach to metal resource utilization, with electronic waste (e‐waste) and waste catalysts being the most important recycling resources. Although traditional recovery technologies (pyrometallurgy and hydrometallurgy) have a recovery efficiency of up to 100%, they have disadvantages of high energy consumption, high cost, and strong corrosiveness. Most importantly, they cannot achieve selective leaching. To address these issues, some fusion technologies have been developed. Electrodeposition has significant advantages in separating and purifying each metal, but if applied on a large scale in industry, it requires higher energy consumption. While photocatalytic technology has low energy consumption but low selectivity, hence further exploration is needed. Metal‐organic frameworks (MOFs) materials have great selectivity for metal ions, which are environmentally friendly and efficient, and a promising new material. Some recently typical recovery methods for six valuable metals, platinum (Pt), gold (Au), silver (Ag), lithium (Li), nickel (Ni), and cobalt (Co) in e‐waste and industrial catalysts are reviewed. The advantages and disadvantages of each method as well as their impact on the leaching efficiency and selectivity of different metals are also compared, aiming to provide useful guidance for further continuously advancing the research on efficient, selective, environmentally friendly metal recycling in the future.