Metals recovery from dust derived from recycling line of waste printed circuit boards

Dust is an indispensable byproduct in the physical-mechanical recycling process of waste printed circuit boards. It is in urgent need for recycling valuable materials from dust because of high economic value and serious pollution. In this study, a novel technology of vibrated gas-solid fluidized bed was proposed to recover metals from dust with a size fraction of -0.5 mm. Firstly, the mineralogical properties were analyzed by advanced analysis technologies, and then the triboelectric separation was applied to remove glass fibers from dust to eliminate the effect of agglomeration that was caused by glass fibers in the process of density-segregation. The results demonstrated that the major metal elements were Fe, Cu, Mn, Zn and Mg, and the content of metals accounted for 18.865 wt.% in -0.5 mm size fraction of dust. The metal content increased to 21.852 wt.% after removing glass fibers. The metal recovery rate was up to 78.77%, which demonstrated that the vibrated gas-solid fluidized bed had obvious recovery efficiency for metals from dust. This research work may provide an alternative approach for industrial recycling WPCBs dust, and reduce the secondary waste generated in PCBs recycling. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.