Precious Metals in Scrap?

Sceadwian said:

You want to do something that will recover a trivial amount of raw materials and expend more energy in the process than creating new materials from mined components....

I think we need a sanity check here.

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ok i will give you a sanity check. but please actualy read the links and material that was provided. the trivel amount you speack of is around $27,000 of material from 1 (ONE) ton of waste. the UN reports states that the amount of material gained from waste is MANY MANY times more than can be mined from raw gold ore etc. or to make it simple as you seemed to have missed the whole point the report was making. according to the report done by scientist for the United Nations and heads of goverment it MAKES MORE sense to reclaim the material that continueing to waste it and mine more. there is your sanity check. you demand proof and reports and links, i gave them you then completely ignore there content or simply dismiss them, on what i can only assume are on the grounds that they dont back up what you would like them to say.
and yet again we are waiting for ANY (yes includeing some dubious wikipedia link) that even hints at it not being a sensiable viable economic practice. lets face it scead the reality check needed is where do you draw the line at refuseing to belive something solely on the basis that it dosnt say what you wish it to?? i even updated the figures with current metal values. at least have an attempt at crunching down figures like i did and show me even some half believeable ones that show its a waste of time and effort.
i didnt come into this thread on some kind of crusade i merely related something i had seen and found interesting. i have then tried to gether up info that would show wether or not reclaiming was viable on a small scale. i would have been just as happy had i found something that had half hinted it was pointless but the truth is i havnt managed to find ANYTHING that even sugests it isnt a hugely profitable option, and as is often the case so far you have done NOTHING not a single thing includeing a quick calculation on the back of a napkin that shows its a waste of time.
its very iratating when you simply state something as if its written in the gospel as a fact, then stick hard and fast to your opinion simply because its yours! and yet make ZERO attempt to prove your point, but still have the nerve to ask everyone else to prove theres. this kind of practice it has to be said is forum trolling at its very worse. so time to put up some facts (i will settle for half facts if thats all you can manage) that show its not economical on a small scale, or i think you realy should think about letting this one go.
sorry mods just my opinion, and i prefer to call it as i see it. i also except that this may well be deleted and of course fully except that.

ghostman11 said:

ok i will give you a sanity check. but please actualy read the links and material that was provided. the trivel amount you speack of is around $27,000 of material from 1 (ONE) ton of waste.

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Assuming that figure is correct?, did it also say how much it actually cost to recover? - and obviously it's highly dependent on the specific material being processed.

Nigel Goodwin said:

Assuming that figure is correct?, did it also say how much it actually cost to recover? - and obviously it's highly dependent on the specific material being processed.

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a few posts back nigel i posted some links and a exstract from a united nations report and other places that were based on the report, the figure and average quantiys are there and relate to the content on average to 1 ton ewaste (i think in the case quoted it was based on mobile phones but without rereading i wont vouch that). the amount of material in 1 ton (approx 6000 phones) is emense, the figure it gave for value was based on 1998 prices so i broke it down using the quantitys given in the report to relate to the value of each of the metals that were mentioned. i then checked yestadays prices for those metals and updated the figures. so the figure i gave should be pretty accurate in relation to the report i used.
as for cost of recovery it seems sized based. but for small scale (say 1 ton 1 month) then there should be good profit as the process mainly involves two cheap chemicals both of wich are concentrated and i know happen to be cheap.
the other smaller wuantitys of chemicals used from what i can tell also not that exspensive and are certainly availiable in the lab at my uni. as for actual cost of recovery i havnt worked that out yet as i seem to be the only one bothering to crunch figures i asked scead to crunch them and see if he could show that it wasnt economical, but so far people are only willing to say it isnt cost effective without actualy trying to prove it. i realy dont know how cost effective it is i am going on facts i have got online (from scientific reports) and experiance of the cost of theese chemicals. based on what i saw in the bang goes the therory program the actual 'work' involved isnt that bad mainly being one of chopping up (in there case smashing with a large hammer) chips etc and subjected them to several chemical process non of wich contained mercury. the program i gave the episode and season number but couldnt find the clip on iplayer.
all in all for £27K i would consider it viable. that said if i was seriously considering it as a business proposal i would spend money on research before commiting my money, but i origanaly posted a answer that was merely relating a program i had seen. now however i realy would like to know just how much profit there is in it for no other reason than curiosity

ghostman11 said:

i just thought i would also point that while it may indeed be true that gold content has decreased, there seems to be two faators you are neglected to take into account
1) we are talking scrap so that is likely to mean "older" E scrap past being useful and therefore possiably more precious metal content
2) the price quoted was $300 per ounce (troy) current value per ounce(troy) $1,787, i would have thought that this rise in price alone more than covers the decrease in content for newer scrap.
thank you for the link brown out

i also found the following that may be of interest and at least has some figures, although i exspect theese to be fully discounted
http://www.electronicstakeback.com/wp-content/uploads/Facts_and_Figures
interesting figure for cell phones
1 ton cell phones (approx 6000 phones) contains $15,000 in precious metals and thats at a very low metal price (1998).
to quote "“A ton of used mobile phones, for example – or approximately 6,000 handsets (a tiny fraction of today's 1 billion annual production) ‐‐ contains about 3.5 kilograms of silver, 340 grams of gold, 140 grams of palladium, and 130 kg of copper, according to StEP. The average mobile phone battery contains another 3.5 grams of copper. Combined value: over US $15,000 at today's prices.”32"
and just to dot the i's and cross the T's for those that need it, the source they are quoting is
32 United Nations University (2009, September 17). Set World Standards For Electronics Recycling, Reuse To Curb E‐waste Exports To Developing Countries, Experts Urge. ScienceDaily. Retrieved September 21, 2009, from http://www.sciencedaily.com /releases/2009/09/090915140919.htm
i would have thought they could be considered a reliable source.
so yeah i guess brownout hit the nail on the head... the info is actualy out there if you look! although i still havnt seen anything that would make me think small scale reclaiming wasnt viable

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there you go nigel the post where i put the figures, it got a bit lost amongst all the other stuff! i checked out there references that they give for the figures used. and indeed the UN report they base it on backs what they saying.
is it right or wrong??? ive no idea but i wouldnt dismiss the source as its referenced well, and NOT one person has provided economic data to sugest that its not viable, the closet so far is its not enviromental, wich again the UN report sugests it is.

Lets assume for the moment the $27,000 is correct.
1 ton = 907 kg
so 1kg = $27,000/907 = $29

According to this page - https://shorinternational.com/RefinAcidinstr.htm - it takes around 4 liters of aqua-regia to process 1kg of scrap.

For argument's sake, let's say the ONLY thing you needed to process the scrap was aqua-regia. What does aqua-regia cost? These guys want $63 for 1/2 liter. https://www.chemical-supermarket.com/product.php?productid=556

So you would wind up spending $504 in your little "cottage industry" to get $29 of precious metals back.

is that the cheapest place to buy it from then? can it be reused?
you are talking about a simple mixture of two very very commonly used concentrated acids! i buy concentrated Nitric acid from a company called labpak its the real and is nowhere that exspensive. i am also pretty sure its easily reuseable but of course unlike others i will check and then report back


ok update.
i wouldnt buy from them!!! is a rip off. the two acids used are conc hydrochloric and conc nitric
chk theese prices per TON!! **broken link removed**
note nitric acid £85 per tonne! hydrochloric acid per tonne £125
BTW a tonne is approx 1176.47 liters thats a huge difference in price! i didnt check ebay as i didnt think it relevant i will also check uni price when i am next there but i exspect they are a little pricy due to the grade of acid etc

Here again its not just the costs of the machines or cemicals.
How much would it cost to met EPA standerds?
How much would it cost to dispose of the waste generated?
How much would the laber cost?

This is what drives it overseas.

Ghostman. I'll issue a standing warrant to sign a check over to you for the entire sum of my yearly income if you can make this work on a for profit basis for precious metal recovery.
I will sleep just fine knowing that it will never occur.

Hi guys. Not sure if anyone's posted this link yet or not, so I thought I'd post it just in case.

https://www.goldnscrap.com/index.ph...oards&catid=34:scrap-circuit-boards&Itemid=27

EDIT: Just found an article about it, as well. Again, not sure if anyone has posted this yet or not (sorry, I didn' t feel like reading through 7 pages right now ):



EDIT EDIT: Sorry for the second edit, but I had to post this, too

https://www.ehow.com/how_4843105_extract-gold-computer-circuit-boards.html

Sceadwian said:

Ghostman. I'll issue a standing warrant to sign a check over to you for the entire sum of my yearly income if you can make this work on a for profit basis for precious metal recovery.
I will sleep just fine knowing that it will never occur.

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so to make this clear... your saying what exactly?? if i can make a profit in recovered metal from 1 ton of e waste i get the check?? or if i can make a profit (reasonable sum say around £350 (profit) in a week) from reclaiming e waste?
define the terms a little clearer. if its just an experiment to see if theres profit in it i dont mind giving it a go for a couple of weeks. but i dont want your money i would however donate it and any profit made, to a charity of your choice. so be clear on the parameters as i dont want the goal posts changing half way through.

No, you have to make a profit from the recovery of precious metals from e-waste, to avoid any possible tampering with the type of 'waste' that's being used I'll limit it strictly to PC motherboards. If you want to include any other type of e-waste I can approve it on a case by case basis.

It's already an established fact that recyling of e-waste can be profitiable, my entire contention with you from the start is based on the TITLE OF THIS THREAD, precious metals recovery.
I know for fact that the precious metal content of general e-waste is inconsequential to the the non-precious metals and materials content, that is all I was ever trying to say.

pc mother boards!! come off it, this is what i was saying about changeing the goals. ewast by default should include mobile phones and ANY pcb's OR components. as for metals recovered i will help you again here and only go for 2 metals gold and copper. so how much margin do i have to make then? 20% over and above cost?

More profitable than the precious metals may simply be the chips themselves. On a couple of occasions I have been asked to code a FPGA or microcontroller to replace the functionality of a no-longer-obtainable chip used in machine tools built in the 1970's. I wonder how many of those chips got ground to dust because someone thought they would get rich recovering the microscopic specs of gold from them?

duffy said:

More profitable than the precious metals may simply be the chips themselves. On a couple of occasions I have been asked to code a FPGA or microcontroller to replace the functionality of a no-longer-obtainable chip used in machine tools built in the 1970's. I wonder how many of those chips got ground to dust because someone thought they would get rich recovering the microscopic specs of gold from them?

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After doing some research, I agree with duffy. You can probably get more money by simply selling the boards or components alone, or repairing them. IMHO salvaging the precious metals probably is not worth the cost of equipment or boards.

DerStrom8 said:

After doing some research, I agree with duffy. You can probably get more money by simply selling the boards or components alone, or repairing them. IMHO salvaging the precious metals probably is not worth the cost of equipment or boards.

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turn around through selling for alot of stuff would be too slow, repair in most cases i would have thought non viable from a profit point of view. take mobile phones. they go out of fashion real quick and people want the lastest high tech one. so even if you repaired one the chances of selling it in a decent time frame are slim. as for equipment something to chip and grind.....real easy for me just through it all in the feed press stick a bucket under and hey presto granualted chips to any size you like.
chemicals......easy again we are a farm we hold several accounts with industrial chemical suppliers and use some chemicals (such as ammonium nitrate) that are far more tightly controlled than nitric or hydrochloric acid.
cost of waste to process...even easier i have a barn full of it i purchased cheap enough to consider using, failing that i have a couple of ideas of where i can obtain some i have no intention of doing this full time but as a one off experiment to win a bet and see just how much profit (or not) can be made from this stuff i am more than game to give a week or two of my time to try it. and lets face it the chance to win a years worth of someones salary makes it a no brainer.
oh just incase it gets mentioned (trust me its bound to) waste disposal...... again being a farm we have contracts with all kinds of hazadous waste contractors that we use in our every day work so safe disposal of anything that needs it wont be a problem (or that exspensive as we arnt talking absolutely huge amounts). lets face it guys has gotta be worth a punt if only for the hell of it???

ghostman11 said:

turn around through selling for alot of stuff would be too slow

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And trying to salvage the miniscule amounts of precious metals wouldn't? I am by no means saying you shouldn't try it, I am simply saying that I don't feel it would be worth it.

ghostman11 said:

turn around through selling for alot of stuff would be too slow, repair in most cases i would have thought non viable from a profit point of view. take mobile phones. they go out of fashion real quick and people want the lastest high tech one. so even if you repaired one the chances of selling it in a decent time frame are slim. as for equipment something to chip and grind.....real easy for me just through it all in the feed press stick a bucket under and hey presto granualted chips to any size you like.
chemicals......easy again we are a farm we hold several accounts with industrial chemical suppliers and use some chemicals (such as ammonium nitrate) that are far more tightly controlled than nitric or hydrochloric acid.
cost of waste to process...even easier i have a barn full of it i purchased cheap enough to consider using, failing that i have a couple of ideas of where i can obtain some i have no intention of doing this full time but as a one off experiment to win a bet and see just how much profit (or not) can be made from this stuff i am more than game to give a week or two of my time to try it. and lets face it the chance to win a years worth of someones salary makes it a no brainer.
oh just incase it gets mentioned (trust me its bound to) waste disposal...... again being a farm we have contracts with all kinds of hazadous waste contractors that we use in our every day work so safe disposal of anything that needs it wont be a problem (or that exspensive as we arnt talking absolutely huge amounts). lets face it guys has gotta be worth a punt if only for the hell of it???

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Sorry, but I think you're dreaming - not least about having existing contracts for cheap disposal of industrial waste.

I live in the country, and always have, I've never seen (or heard of) farmers having industrial waste disposal contracts.

But assuming you can recover gold etc. from phones, how much do you expect to get from each pghone - ignoring the costs of doing it.

BTW - thread moved to Members Lounge, it's nothing to do with Electronics - moderator.

Nigel Goodwin said:

Sorry, but I think you're dreaming - not least about having existing contracts for cheap disposal of industrial waste.

I live in the country, and always have, I've never seen (or heard of) farmers having industrial waste disposal contracts.

But assuming you can recover gold etc. from phones, how much do you expect to get from each pghone - ignoring the costs of doing it.

BTW - thread moved to Members Lounge, it's nothing to do with Electronics - moderator.

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HMMM many many farms if not most i know of use waste contractors. at the very least animal disposal is classed as haz waste! or what we use to call the knacker man. when the dairy was running here we used waste contractors to remove the flash pits where all the slurry and chemical steralizer are washed into (thats been special waste a good few years). seepage tanks from older non bunded fuel tanks has to be pumped out by haz waste contractors! and licensed, cant remember the size now but over a certain size all tanks are bunded under a certain size older tanks may be unbunded but the catch pits have to be pumped out and proper disposal.
liquid chemicals from herbs and ferts have to go by way of special carrier and so do the holding tanks. gone (LONG GONE!!) are the days where a properly operating farm can just pressure was out large chemical vesels, round here we keep it legal. actualy most modern farms use a whole range of chemicals some like the one mentioned ammonium nitrate are now very very tightly controlled. some of the pestacides are classed as cat 2 waste
no idea wich bit the uk you in NIGEL but dont sound like its farming country
E waste (Electronic waste) nothing to do with electronics???...........ok your the boss your rules


i actualy forgot my fave current brussels edict.....................wool that collects on fences and blows around fields is classed as a animal waste product and should be picked up and disposed of by a proper animal waste contractor fine for non complience is i think around £2.5k! so yeah farmers and waste people have contracts

As someone who gets a measurable amount of his annual income from scrapping anything and everything that has anything of value in it I can assure you rule one of salvage work is don't nit pick the details of whats worth what on the small scale.

Volume is what counts and what makes anything profitable. Picking up old pop cans and soup cans out of the trash for their aluminum and steel value is pointless unless you can get them by the box loads from restaurants and bars.

That goes just the same with electronics as well. Stripping a single or even a few TVs or computers for the copper, aluminum, steel, and trace precious metals is a pointless waste of time but stripping a few hundred is where it becomes rather profitable and thats only where going after the precious metals becomes justifiable.

Regarding EPA and other regulatory agencies. Don't ask and don't tell and if you can get chemicals on eBay on the cheap that more than counts too.

Personally I will take Sceads annual income on a bet! No charities will be involved either. Just me and my bank account. (And maybe a U-tube video of me laughing as I walk into the bank with his paychecks.)

Regarding EPA and other regulatory agencies. Don't ask and don't tell and if you can get chemicals on eBay on the cheap that more than counts too.

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Thats bad and the point that most of these posters are ignoring!!!!!!!!