Golisano Institute for Sustainability, Rochester Institute of Technology, 111 Lomb Memorial Drive, Rochester, NY 14623, USA.
Waste Manag. 2012 Oct;32(10):1903-13. doi: 10.1016/j.wasman.2012.05.005. Epub 2012 Jun 5.
The increasing growth in generation of electronic waste (e-waste) motivates a variety of waste reduction research. Printed circuit boards (PCBs) are an important sub-set of the overall e-waste stream due to the high value of the materials contained within them and potential toxicity. This work explores several environmental and economic metrics for prioritizing the recovery of materials from end-of-life PCBs. A weighted sum model is used to investigate the trade-offs among economic value, energy saving potentials, and eco-toxicity. Results show that given equal weights for these three sustainability criteria gold has the highest recovery priority, followed by copper, palladium, aluminum, tin, lead, platinum, nickel, zinc, and silver. However, recovery priority will change significantly due to variation in the composition of PCBs, choice of ranking metrics, and weighting factors when scoring multiple metrics. These results can be used by waste management decision-makers to quantify the value and environmental savings potential for recycling technology development and infrastructure. They can also be extended by policy-makers to inform possible penalties for land-filling PCBs or exporting to the informal recycling sector. The importance of weighting factors when examining recovery trade-offs, particularly for policies regarding PCB collection and recycling are explored further.
电子废物（e-waste）产生量的不断增加促使人们开展了各种减少废物的研究。由于电路板（PCBs）中所含材料的高价值和潜在毒性，它们是整个电子废物流的一个重要子集。本工作探讨了几种环境和经济指标，以优先考虑从报废 PCB 中回收材料。使用加权和模型来研究经济价值、节能潜力和生态毒性之间的权衡。结果表明，在这三个可持续性标准中，赋予相同的权重，黄金具有最高的回收优先级，其次是铜、钯、铝、锡、铅、铂、镍、锌和银。然而，由于 PCB 组成、排名指标选择和评分多指标时的加权因素的变化，回收优先级会发生显著变化。这些结果可用于废物管理决策者，以量化回收技术开发和基础设施的价值和环境节约潜力。政策制定者也可以将其扩展，为处理 PCB 或向非正规回收部门出口的行为设定可能的处罚。进一步探讨了在考察回收权衡时加权因素的重要性，特别是对于涉及 PCB 收集和回收的政策。
