There are basically two main possibilities for recovery of critical raw materials (CRM) in Hungary:

 

1. Mining and processing of ore,- mineral and coal mining tailings, fly ashes and metallurgic process of CRM bearing concentrates.

 

Within the frame of this subproject, tailings from Fehérvércsurgó glass sand ; fluorite – polymetallic ore tailing from Pátka and manganese ore tailing from Úrkút are involved. Process engineering technical aspects are  studied using physical (based on magnetic, electric properties or based on different specific gravity), physic-chemical and chemical separation methods.

 

2. Recovery of CRM from construction materials of end of lifetime electric and electronic devices produced for industrial and household use.

 

WEEE, like scrap notebooks, mobile phones, display panels(PDP, LCD, LED-LCD) and PCB’s Critical elements  contain high concentrations of Sb, Be, Co, F, Ga, Ge, Ta, W, In, Nb, Mg, REE, PGE  with precious (Au, Ag, Pt) and base metals (Cu, Pb, Sn, Zn, Al). Base metal bearing parts are separated by  mechanical separation technologies based on specific gravity, magnetic and electric properties can be used for their recovery after a proper comminution stage of the raw material. CRM elements and precious metals however can be found often in very fine particles or as alloys, therefore recovery of them can be done only using chemical or biological extraction and separation. 

 

Institute of Raw Materials Preparation and Process Engineering, Institute of Mineralogy and Geology of Miskolc University are the main partners in the realization of the subproject. Analytical measurements are carried out by Hungarian Scientific Academy, Research Centre for Natural Sciences

 

13.01.2014.

 

Barnabás Csőke, secondary raw materials