How can copper be recycled

This reveals our copper requirements are increasingly being met by metals recycling. A computer contains around 1. Considering copper can be fully recycled and reused again and again, without any loss of performance, we have every incentive to ensure our products and copper waste are correctly processed when they reach the end of their useful lives.

Copper recycling and waste management have become an important part of the supply chain, keeping resources local, creating local jobs, saving on landfill site space and incentivising the recycling of other materials. Bare bright is typically the most valuable kind of copper, but many recycling services accept multiple types of wire. One of the main challenges is that copper needs to be separated from other materials, such as insulation and fittings, before it can be processed and reused.

Stripping electrical wire yourself can be time-consuming if you have a large amount of scrap. Burning insulated copper wire is not a good option, either, as it is harmful for your health, toxic to the environment and illegal in the United States. However, some copper recycling programs make the process easy for you.

They process insulated wire through a chopping machine to separate the copper from the insulation. While recycling copper wire can involve a lot of work, the process itself is simple. The easiest way to sort your scrap is by separating clean wire from dirty wire. Clean wire does not have any insulation, fittings or other materials attached to it, while dirty wire does.

If you have time to strip your wire, you can turn your dirty wire into clean wire. At the scrap yard, the staff will examine and weigh your materials. You should get paid immediately based on the different types of wire you have. No matter how you choose to recycle your copper wire, it will eventually reach a processing facility. At the recycling facility, the insulated wire is first sent through a chopping line, which separates the copper from the insulation. The granulated material then crosses a screener and a density separator.

The recovered copper chops undergo a quality inspection to ensure the metal is contaminant-free and optimal for efficient melting. The scrap is then loaded into a furnace, melted, casted and rolled into rods. Primary copper of the best grade is used for producing the rod for this work. Uncontaminated recycled process scrap and other scrap that has been electrolytically refined back to grade 'A' quality may also be used.

The copper used for power cables is also drawn from high conductivity rod but to a thicker size than fine wires. The quality requirements are therefore slightly less stringent. The presence of any undesirable impurities can cause problems such as hot shortness which gives expensive failures during casting and hot rolling.

For the same reason, scrap containing such impurities can only be used for this purpose if well diluted with good quality copper. For non-electrical purposes, copper is also used to make large quantities of plumbing tube, roofing sheet and heat exchangers.

High electrical conductivity is not mandatory and other quality requirements are not so onerous. Secondary copper can be used for the manufacture of these materials, though still within stipulated quality limits for impurities.

Where scrap copper is associated with other materials, for example after having been tinned or soldered, it will frequently be more economic to take advantage of such contamination than try to remove it by refining. Many specifications for gunmetals and bronzes require the presence of both tin and lead so this type of scrap is ideal feedstock. Normally it is remelted and cast to ingot of certified analysis before use in a foundry.

Scrap of this type commands a lower price than uncontaminated copper. The recycling of brass scrap is a basic essential of the economics of the industry. Brass for extrusion and hot stamping is normally made from a basic melt of scrap of similar composition adjusted by the addition of virgin copper or zinc as required to meet the specification before pouring. The use of brass scrap bought at a significantly lower price than the metal mixture price means that the cost of the fabricated brass is considerably less than it might otherwise be.

The presence in brass of some other elements such as lead is often required to improve machinability so such scrap is frequently acceptable.

Besides the common free-machining brasses, there are many others made for special purposes with properties modified to give extra strength, hardness, corrosion resistance or other attributes, so strict segregation of scrap is essential.

Brass scrap arising from machining operations can be economically remelted but should be substantially free from excess lubricant, especially those including organic compounds that cause unacceptable fume during remelting.

When brass is remelted, there is usually some evolution of the more volatile zinc. This is made up in the melt to bring it back within specification. The zinc is evolved as oxide that is drawn off and trapped in a baghouse and recycled for the manufacture of other products. Brass to be made in to sheet, strip or wire form must be significantly free of harmful impurities in order to retain ductility when cold.