College of Civil Engineering, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen 518060, China.
College of Civil Engineering, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen 518060, China.
Waste Manag. 2017 Oct;68:498-507. doi: 10.1016/j.wasman.2017.07.033. Epub 2017 Jul 26.
Many studies show that high levels of many toxic metals and persistent and bio-accumulative chemicals have been found in electronic waste (e-waste) dismantling sites and their surrounding environmental media. Both flame-retardant plastic housing materials and printed circuit boards (PCBs) could be the major contributors. However, relatively little work has focused on the use or content of toxic substances and their changing in scrap housing materials and PCBs from home appliances. This study evaluated the existence of brominated flame retardants (BFRs, including polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) and Tetrabromobisphenol-A (TBBPA)) in housing plastics and PCBs from home appliances collected from various e-waste recyclers in China. These were then analyzed for the potential migration of BFRs from the e-waste components into their recycled products. The results show that both PBDEs and TBBPA were found with high level in most of e-waste samples, indicating that the widespread use of BFRs in home appliances are entering into the end-of-life stage. For the plastics samples, CRT TVs and LCD monitors should be given priority for the control of BFRs. Regarding PBDEs, the dominant congeners of BDE-209 in the plastics samples contributed 90.72-93.54% to the total concentrations of PBDEs, yet there are large variations for PCBs samples: BDE-28, -47, -99, and -153 were also important congeners compositions, except for BDE-209. Compared with previous studies, the BFRs concentrations in current Chinese e-waste are trending to decline. This study also found that BFRs in housing plastics and PCBs will be transferred into the recycled products with other purpose use, and the new products could have highly enriched capacities for BFRs. The obtained results could be helpful to manage e-waste and their components properly in order to minimize associated environmental and health risks of BFRs, particularly for their further reuse.
许多研究表明，电子废物（e-waste）拆解场地及其周围环境介质中发现了多种有毒金属和持久性、生物累积性化学物质的高浓度。阻燃塑料外壳材料和印刷电路板（PCBs）都可能是主要来源。然而，相对较少的工作集中在来自家用电器的废旧外壳材料和 PCB 中有毒物质的使用或含量及其变化上。本研究评估了从中国不同电子废物回收商处收集的家用电器外壳塑料和 PCB 中溴化阻燃剂（BFRs，包括多溴联苯醚（PBDEs）和四溴双酚 A（TBBPA））的存在。然后分析了这些 BFRs 从电子废物部件向回收产品中潜在迁移的情况。结果表明，大多数电子废物样品中均发现 PBDEs 和 TBBPA 含量较高，这表明家用电器中广泛使用的 BFRs 已进入生命周期末期。对于塑料样品，CRT 电视和液晶显示器应优先控制 BFRs。至于 PBDEs，塑料样品中 BDE-209 的主要同系物占 PBDEs 总浓度的 90.72-93.54%，但 PCB 样品的变化较大：BDE-28、-47、-99 和-153 也是重要的同系物组成，除了 BDE-209。与以前的研究相比，当前中国电子废物中的 BFRs 浓度呈下降趋势。本研究还发现，外壳塑料和 PCB 中的 BFRs 将转移到具有其他用途的回收产品中，新产品对 BFRs 的富集能力很高。研究结果有助于妥善管理电子废物及其部件，以尽量减少 BFRs 相关的环境和健康风险，特别是对其进一步再利用。
