A Review on Copper Recovery from Waste PCBs

Copper content is higher than other metal in the waste printed circuit boards (PCBs), therefore, recycling of copper from PCBs is an important subject not only from the treatment of E-waste but also from the recovery of valuable materials. This article reviews the latest papers on copper recycle processes from waste PCBs developed from laboratories to pilot engineering applications in the latest 5 years. The recovery processes developed from hydrometallurgy, biometallurgy, supercritical fluid, and mechanical-physical are presented. To achieve the higher quality copper from waste PCBs, deep mechanical-physical pretreatment combined with favorable next refine technology should be utilized in a row. All the technologies are tardily developing based on the previous achievement. It is helpful to technology progress of the recourses recovering from PCBs.