A call by commodity research group Roskill last week for a lift in copper recycling globally was a worthy rallying cry, but will it make much difference?
The company pointed to a report by the United Nations last year showing only 17% of end-of-life electronic scrap is recycled. At the same time a record 54m tonnes of “e-waste” was generated worldwide in 2019, up 21% in five years.
That’s $10B of precious metals, including a lot of copper, dumped each year. Australia and New Zealand were the second worst globally for the amount of electronic waste generated, with 21.3 kgs produced per person each year.
We were also almost bottom for recycling with a rate of 9% against Europe’s 42%.
The UN blames a lack of regulation and the short lifespan of products that are hard or impossible to repair. But the huge demand for copper may also finally be making recycling a new commercial market. And maybe that is what it will ultimately take.
Companies active in the copper recycling business in Europe like Freeport-McMoRan-owned Atlantic Copper, is already building a 60,000 tonne per year waste electronic equipment plant in Spain. China is also reported to be looking at regulating copper recycling.
Recycled copper already meets 35% of global demand with the current global end-of-life recycling rate for copper at 40%. In some parts of the world, like the EU, China & Japan, more than half of all copper is recycled after use.
That means copper is inherently well placed to be a leading recycled metal and the economic incentives couldn’t be better right now. But government, the private sector and consumers need to get on board too.
More information: https://sustainablecopper.org/circular-copper/
Cheers, John Fennell