Abstract
The rapid accumulation of end-of-life electronics around the world has a disastrous impact on the environment because much of this otherwise valuable resource goes to landfills. Electronic waste (e-waste) contains significant amounts of precious metals, in the case of gold (Au), far in excess of those found in natural minerals. Recovering these metals from e-waste provides a potential sustainable path, but current recycling routes are not yet up to the task. Here we show a photocatalytic process that allows for selective, efficient and scalable extraction of Au from different forms of e-waste. The dissolution takes no more than 12 h, and further reducing the leachate yields Au metal with purity up to 99.0%. In a large-scale setting, our system can treat 10 kg of e-waste for a single batch and recover 8.82 g of Au. By advancing precious metal recycling to a level closer to practical implementation, this work will contribute to a more sustainable future for electronics.
This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution
Access options
Subscribe to this journal
Receive 12 digital issues and online access to articles
$119.00 per year
only $9.92 per issue
Buy this article
- Purchase on Springer Link
- Instant access to full article PDF
Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout
Similar content being viewed by others
Data availability
The data supporting the findings of this study are available within the article and Supplementary Information. Source data are provided with this paper.
References
Berners-Price, S. J. & Filipovska, A. Gold compounds as therapeutic agents for human diseases. Metallomics 3, 863–873 (2011).
Johnson, D. B. Biomining-biotechnologies for extracting and recovering metals from ores and waste materials. Curr. Opin. Biotechnol. 30, 24–31 (2014).
Hutchings, G. A golden future. Nat. Chem. 1, 584 (2009).
Hughes, M. D. et al. Tunable gold catalysts for selective hydrocarbon oxidation under mild conditions. Nature 437, 1132–1135 (2005).
Corti, C. W. & Holliday, R. J. Commercial aspects of gold applications: from materials science to chemical science. Gold Bull. 37, 20–26 (2004).
Doidge, E. D. et al. A simple primary amide for the selective recovery of gold from secondary resources. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 55, 12436–12439 (2016).
Huang, J. et al. Toxic footprint and materials profile of electronic components in printed circuit boards. Waste Manag. 141, 154–162 (2022).
Ogunseitan, O. A., Schoenung, J. M., Saphores, J.-D. M. & Shapiro, A. A. J. S. The electronics revolution: from e-wonderland to e-wasteland. Science 326, 670–671 (2009).
Wang, Z., Zhang, B. & Guan, D. Take responsibility for electronic-waste disposal. Nature 536, 23–25 (2016).
Sun, B., Schnoor, J. L. & Zeng, E. Y. Decadal journey of e-waste recycling: what has it achieved? Environ. Sci. Technol. 56, 12785–12792 (2022).
Pan, X., Wong, C. W. Y. & Li, C. Circular economy practices in the waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) industry: a systematic review and future research agendas. J. Clean. Prod. 365, 132671 (2022).
Lu, Y. & Xu, Z. Precious metals recovery from waste printed circuit boards: a review for current status and perspective. Resour. Conserv. Recycl. 113, 28–39 (2016).
Rao, M. D., Singh, K. K., Morrison, C. A. & Love, J. B. Challenges and opportunities in the recovery of gold from electronic waste. RSC Adv. 10, 4300–4309 (2020).
Sheng, P. P. & Etsell, T. H. Recovery of gold from computer circuit board scrap using aqua regia. Waste Manag. 25, 380–383 (2007).
Li, F. et al. Highly efficient and selective extraction of gold by reduced graphene oxide. Nat. Commun. 13, 4472 (2022).
Cao, J. et al. Tailoring the asymmetric structure of NH2–UiO-66 metal–organic frameworks for light-promoted selective and efficient gold extraction and separation. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 135, e202302202 (2023).
Hong, Y. et al. Precious metal recovery from electronic waste by a porous porphyrin polymer. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 117, 16174–16180 (2020).
Virolainen, S., Tyster, M., Haapalainen, M. & Sainio, T. Ion exchange recovery of silver from concentrated base metal-chloride solutions. Hydrometallurgy 152, 100–106 (2015).
Song, Q., Sun, H., Zhang, L. & Xu, Z. Renewable redox couple system for sustainable precious metal recycling from e-waste via halide-regulated potential inversion. J. Hazard. Mater. 420, 126568 (2021).
Lin, R. L. et al. Selective recovery and detection of gold with cucurbit[n]urils (n = 5–7). Inorg. Chem. 59, 3850–3855 (2020).
Yue, C. et al. Environmentally benign, rapid, and selective extraction of gold from ores and waste electronic materials. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 56, 9331–9335 (2017).
Chen, Y. et al. Selective recovery of precious metals through photocatalysis. Nat. Sustain. 4, 618–626 (2021).
Kaya, M. Recovery of metals and nonmetals from electronic waste by physical and chemical recycling processes. Waste Manag. 57, 64–90 (2016).
Bahadoran, A. et al. Photocatalytic materials obtained from e-waste recycling: review, techniques, critique, and update. J. Manuf. Mater. Process. 6, 69 (2022).
Rigoldi, A. et al. Advances in recovering noble metals from waste printed circuit boards (WPCBs). ACS Sustain. Chem. Eng. 7, 1308–1317 (2018).
James, F. R., Gerald, O. R. & Jane, B. Selective electroless nickel deposition on copper as a final barrier/bonding layer material for microelectronics applications. Appl. Surf. Sci. 185, 289–297 (2002).
Liang, C. J. & Li, J. Y. Recovery of gold in iodine–iodide system—a review. Sep. Sci. Technol. 54, 1055–1066 (2018).
Jadhao, P. R., Pandey, A., Pant, K. K. & Nigam, K. D. P. Efficient recovery of Cu and Ni from WPCB via alkali leaching approach. J. Environ. Manage. 296, 113154 (2021).
Chippindale, A. M. et al. Mixed copper, silver, and gold cyanides, (MxM′(1−x))CN: tailoring chain structures to influence physical properties. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 134, 16387–16400 (2012).
Yi, W. et al. A new application of the traditional Fenton process to gold cyanide synthesis using acetonitrile as a cyanide source. RSC Adv. 6, 16448–16451 (2016).
Li, R. et al. Radical-involved photosynthesis of AuCN oligomers from Au nanoparticles and acetonitrile. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 134, 18286–18294 (2012).
Lu, L. et al. Cyanide radical chemisorbed Pt electrocatalyst for enhanced methanol-tolerant oxygen reduction reactions. J. Phys. Chem. C 120, 11572–11580 (2016).
Wang, Z. et al. Contact-electro-catalysis for the degradation of organic pollutants using pristine dielectric powders. Nat. Commun. 13, 130 (2022).
Wang, Z. et al. Potential safety hazards associated with using acetonitrile and a strong aqueous base. Org. Process Res. Dev. 21, 1501–1508 (2017).
Zhu, Y. et al. Photocatalytic degradation of GenX in water using a new adsorptive photocatalyst. Water Res. 220, 118650 (2022).
Tachikawa, T. & Majima, T. Single-molecule fluorescence imaging of TiO2 photocatalytic reactions. Langmuir 25, 7791–7802 (2009).
Chen, Y. et al. Photocatalytic dissolution of precious metals by TiO2 through photogenerated free radicals. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 61, e202213640 (2022).
Macchione, M. A. et al. Gold decoration of silica by decomposition of aqueous gold(III) hydroxide at low temperatures. RSC Adv. 8, 19979–19989 (2018).
Frolova, L. Investigation of co-precipitation of Fe(II) and Ni(II) hydroxides. Mater. Lett. 275, 128065 (2020).
Chen, X. et al. Separation and recovery of metal values from leaching liquor of mixed-type of spent lithium-ion batteries. Sep. Purif. Technol. 144, 197–205 (2015).
Wang, J., Lu, Y. & Xu, Z. Identifying extraction technology of gold from solid waste in terms of environmental friendliness. ACS Sustain. Chem. Eng. 7, 7260–7267 (2019).
Imre-Lucaci, Á., Nagy, M., Imre-Lucaci, F. & Fogarasi, S. Technical and environmental assessment of gold recovery from secondary streams obtained in the processing of waste printed circuit boards. Chem. Eng. J. 309, 655–662 (2017).
Wang, R. et al. Interfacial coordinational bond triggered photoreduction membrane for continuous light-driven precious metals recovery. Nano Lett. 23, 2219–2227 (2023).
Wang, R. et al. Interfacial coordination bonding-assisted redox mechanism-driven highly selective precious metal recovery on covalent-functionalized ultrathin 1T-MoS2. ACS Appl. Mater. Interfaces 15, 9331–9340 (2023).
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (2020YFA0211004), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (22176128, 22236005), Innovation Program of Shanghai Municipal Education Commission (2023ZKZD50), Program of Shanghai Academic Research Leader (21XD1422800), Shanghai Government (22dz1205400, 23520711100), Chinese Education Ministry Key Laboratory and International Joint Laboratory on Resource Chemistry, and Shanghai Eastern Scholar Program. We thank the ‘111 Innovation and Talent Recruitment Base on Photochemical and Energy Materials’ (no. D18020), Shanghai Engineering Research Center of Green Energy Chemical Engineering (18DZ2254200) and Shanghai Frontiers Science Center of Biomimetic Catalysis.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Contributions
Z.B. and H.L. conceived the idea for the paper. H.S., Y.C. and Z.B. designed the experiments. S.G. performed theoretical computational analyses. H.S. carried out the experiments. Y.W., J.C. and X.W. helped with the sample characterization. H.S. and Z.B. analysed the data and wrote the manuscript. All authors contributed to discussing, writing and revising the paper.
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Competing interests
The authors declare no competing interests.
Peer review
Peer review information
Nature Chemical Engineering thanks Hong Chen, Jianping Xie and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work.
Additional information
Publisher’s note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Supplementary information
Supplementary Information
Supplementary Notes 1–7, Figs. 1–29, Tables 1–10 and references.
Supplementary Video 1
The working principle of the equipment.
Supplementary Video 2
Actual device operation.
Supplementary Data
Optimized density functional theory atomic coordinates data.
Source data
Source Data Fig. 1
Statistical source data.
Source Data Fig. 2
Statistical source data.
Source Data Fig. 3
Statistical source data.
Source Data Fig. 4
Statistical source data.
Source Data Fig. 6
Statistical source data.
Rights and permissions
Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.
About this article
Cite this article
Shang, H., Chen, Y., Guan, S. et al. Scalable and selective gold recovery from end-of-life electronics. Nat Chem Eng 1, 170–179 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s44286-023-00026-w
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s44286-023-00026-w