Dear Harvey,
thanks for your valuable comments on recycling activities. Maybe you can
share some more information on what ECS Refining is doing. If anyone from
ECS subscribes this mailing list, he/she might respond as well.
Recycling tin-lead from electronics scrap is not that easy:
1) Which kind and amounts of PCB scrap is recycled and which amount of
tin-lead is recycled from PCB-scrap/components (range of magnitude)? Do they
got PCB scrap from production wastes or also from reassembled electronic
products? Do they have any restrictions for acceptance of PCB scrap?
ECS recycles solder waste, dross etc. as well, but that's surely a seperate
process and comparingly easy to handle.
2) As far as I know, tin and lead recycling of PCB scrap in a thermal
process is possible, but the maximum recycling rate of tin and lead recycled
is about 50%. The losses mainly via slag are not negligible - and these
losses are seeing the environment as hazardous waste. Does ECS give any
recycling rate for tin and lead from PCB scrap (not for drosses, old pastes
etc. which will be in a range above 90% recyling)? Due to my knowledge the
recycling loop can't be really closed by any economically feasible
technology by now.
3) How do they deal with the problem of dioxins and furans, which are a
problem for thermal processing of halogenated PCB scrap and needs advanced
abatement technologies?
4) Recycled tin-lead from secondary smelters usually contain amounts of Bi
and Sb which hinder a reuse for electronics solder. Do you know anything
about this problem according to ECS or what Fry is doing to reduce the Bi
and Sb content? Blending it with primary material would be a solution to
meet the limits but would be no solution for a completely closed recycling
loop.
Sorry for bothering you with details, but I want to be sure that the system
really could get closed.
Best wishes
Karsten Schischke
----------------------------------------------------
Karsten Schischke
Berlin Center of Advanced Packaging
@ Technische Universität Berlin
TIB 4/2-1
BeCAP partner:
Fraunhofer Institut Zuverlässigkeit und Mikrointegration (IZM)
Gustav-Meyer-Allee 25
13355 Berlin
Germany
Fon: +49/ (0) 30 / 464 03 - 156
[log in to unmask]
www.izm.fraunhofer.de
-------------------------------------------------------
----- Original Message -----
From: "Harvey Miller" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, January 05, 2002 3:04 AM
Subject: Re: [LF] Matsushita Succeeds in Recycling Solder Residue Using
Sesame Seeds
> So Matsushita is recycling "solder". GREAT! But what are they doing
about
> all that SnPb solder in the tons of legacy electronics?
>
> We recently visited the ECS Refining plant in Santa Clara CA. In one end
go
> thousands of Printed Circuit Boards, out the other end comes out a
mountain
> of SnPb solder. The Tin-Lead solder is sent to Fry, etc. for purification
> and re-use as electronic solder. The lead never sees the the environment
and
> the environment never sees it. Could it be that we are ahead of
Matsushita
> in the good old USof A with a closed system, similar to what is done with
> battery lead, that makes lead-free completely UNNECESSARY. Do you think
> that it may be possible that Matsushita will catch up, and save the
> electronics industry hundreds of millions of $? Also, save the
environment
> from worse contaminants, more difficult to recycle; save the environment
from
> the need to mine more tin and silver-- needed to replace abundant, cheap
lead
> that is needed anyway for shielding and batteries, in much, much higher
> quantities.
>
> When will Matsushita become rational? Or is it MITI that is calling the
tune?
>
> Harvey Miller
>
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