The Royal British Mint turns e-waste into gold
8 August 2024 04:01
The Royal United Kingdom Mint has started recycling electronic waste to extract gold. This is reported by "Komersant Ukrainian" with reference to the BBC.
The company has built a large industrial plant in Llantrisant, Wales, where it will recycle old printed circuit boards for gold.
The Royal Mint’s new plant will process about 4000 tonnes of e-waste annually.
The gold will be used to make jewellery and commemorative coins.
First, the circuit boards are heated to remove their components. The separated coils, capacitors, pins and transistors are then sorted, cut and crushed on a conveyor belt. Anything containing gold is set aside separately.
Up to 450 kg of gold can be recovered from 4,000 tonnes of e-waste, which is worth about £27 million at current prices.
The problem of e-waste, which includes everything from old phones and computers to televisions, is growing rapidly: according to the UN, 62 million tonnes of electronics were discarded in 2022. A recent report predicts that waste will increase by a third by 2030.
The Royal Mint has no shortage of e-waste. In the UN’s 2024 e-waste report, the UK is the second largest producer of e-waste per capita, behind only Norway.
In addition to recovering gold, the Mint is also looking into what to do with other materials (aluminium, copper, tin, etc.) that can be recovered from electronic circuit boards.
Moving into the waste business is a big change for the Royal Mint. For more than a thousand years, it has been the official maker of the UK’s coins. But as the use of cash declines, e-waste is a new way for public companies to make money and keep jobs.
