A Brief Guide to Precious Metal Recovery

You may be thinking – what is precious metal recovery? It’s a specialist service where precious metals are recovered from jewellery, ornaments, electrical components, catalytic converters, and many more objects.

Why do we do need it? Studies have shown that we will eventually run out of precious metals and they’ve been included on the EU’s list of critical raw materials. In terms of technological progress, we need these precious metals in our smartphones, in electric vehicles, solar panels and wind turbines.

So, what objects can you recover precious metals from and can you make any money from it?

What Do People Tend to Melt Down?

Precious metals can be found in many items around the home. The most common one that comes to mind is jewellery, including gold plated watches or sterling silver jewellery.

For businesses, there could be a prime opportunity here. Military, automotive and aerospace companies could recover precious metals from aerospace turbine blades, vanes, fuel nozzles and specialist alloys, to name a few. Once the platinum or gold is removed from these, the customer’s account is credited and the base alloy is returned to them.

If you have any old electronics, the circuit boards could contain gold parts, and even mobile phones contain gold components that could be recovered. There’s a gram of gold in around 35-40 mobile phones and although this won’t rival the amount of gold we produce from mining, but it’s a productive way to recycle waste.

The Recovery Process

Recovering precious metals is a complex process involving precious metal recovery incinerators, which:

• Burn waste materials.
• The precious metals remain in the slag after incineration.
• Metals are collected on removable ceramic dishes within the combustion chamber.

The typical metals that are recovered are typically gold, silver, platinum or palladium.

If you’ve got any objects that you think you can recover precious metal from, make sure you find a reputable metal recovery company to work with. It’s a complicated process with a number of steps that require delicacy and precision.

Plus, some precious metal companies have environmentally-conscious practices and comply with environmental regulations, as well as using as little fuel as possible.

So, next time you see that old mobile phone you have lying around, or your business has some old electronics that aren’t used anymore, think about their precious metal components and how they can be recovered. Not only will you be helping with the potential shortage of these precious metals, but you could also make some money from them.