E-waste treatment: New technology trends
Vietnamese researchers have developed e-waste treatment technologies that can replace the current major methods of collection, dismantling, and demolition.
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Circuit board incinerator and metal recycling. Photo: LVL
On October 15, Ho Chi Minh City Center for Science and Technology Information and Statistics held an online workshop "Technological trends for electronic waste treatment (e-waste)", to introduce technologies that are researched in the country, can be transferred to units and enterprises dealing with electronic wastes.
Mainly collecting and dismantling
Assoc. Prof. Nguyen Duc Quang, Hanoi Polytechnic University, said that currently, the amount of e-wastes in Vietnam is increasing rapidly (about 2.7kg/person/year in 2020), but it is still lower than the world average (7.3kg/person/year). However, along with the increasing standard of living, the amount of e-wastes in Vietnam is forecasted to continue to increase rapidly in the near future, with more diversity in categories.
In developed countries, electronic waste is on the list of products subject to recall and handling under the extended liability mechanism of the manufacturer. However, in Vietnam, e-waste arising from households is not yet under the management of the state, but mainly collected and recycled by the private sector. In addition to the amount of e-waste generated domestically, a large amount of e-waste and second-hand electronics are illegally imported. In addition, there is no legal document in the country that specifically regulates the management of e-wastes in particular.
Assoc. Prof. Nguyen Duc Quang added that at present, e-waste is collected, dismantled, sorted and recycled mainly by the private sector on a small and medium scale. Most of the collection and dismantling is not in accordance with the regulations and only focuses on recovering materials that are easy to recover and recycle, such as some metals, the rest is destroyed or goes to solid waste landfills. Currently, there are about 30 companies licensed to handle electronic wastes in the country with a capacity of 0.25 - 30 tons/day, most of which focus on dismantling. In which, only 4 companies have enough technology lines licensed to process electronic circuit boards.
In addition, the solution of handling and recycling electronic components of HiTech Vietnam Technology Development Joint Stock Company, ensures complete deformation of hardware devices (hard drives, boards, screens, electricity, telephones, ATM boards, etc.), prevent data leakage, enhance security for prototyping and security. At the same time, good support for the stages of sorting, separating plastic materials from metal in the processing process.
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