E-cycling of electronic products to control harzardous substances based on XRF analysis

Abstract

Nowadays, the mobile technology is developing rapidly. The use of mobile phone is booming throughout the world in past ten years. The penetration and changing rate of mobiles are very high in developed countries and certain cities such as the USA, UK, Japan and Hong Kong. Millions of mobile phones were discarded every year but only few percent of them were recycled. Improper disposal of these waste mobiles is definitely a threat to our environment and health as they contain hazardous such as lead, mercury and cadmium. This report aims to arouse public concerns to the pollution caused by e-waste including mobile phones. The object of this project is to investigate what hazardous substances and valuable materials are present in a mobile phone by XRF analysis. Effective ways on controlling the hazardous substances will be proposed, and some suggestions on how to achieve higher recycling rate will be given.