Recycling critical raw materials from waste electronic equipment

Recycling critical raw materials
from waste electronic equipment
result of the life cycle inventory analysis, the areas highlighted in bold red in the above table
suggest a suitable prioritization for the present or future recycling efforts for the selected
metals.
Market situation and development
For the four groups of devices studied, the market situation and its future development can
be summarized as follows:
In the TV segment, LCD flat screens displayed renewed strong growth in sales figures in
Germany (8.3 million appliances in 2010, up 9.3% compared with 2009). The number of flat
screen TV sets in private households is currently estimated at around 50 million, of which by
far the largest proportion are LCD televisions. Significant technical trends for this group of
appliances are an increasing proportion of appliances with LEDs (2011: 40%) for the
background illumination and a clear tendency to have ever larger screen sizes. Sales figures
for the PC monitor segment showed a steep downward trend of minus 21% (2010: 2.6
million devices sold). A corresponding marked trend towards notebooks and tablet PCs was
apparent.
Notebooks have become the driving force on the German computer market. Sales of mobile
computers for the private sector have increased by a factor of 3-4 since 2005. A total of
7,097,000 notebooks (including tablet PCs) were sold in the private sector in Germany in
2010. Tablet PCs are likely to have a market share of up to 30% in 2013. In 2010 the
percentage of LEDs for background illumination was already 92% worldwide. The trend
towards tablet PCs promotes the use of higher numbers of LEDs (in comparison to
notebooks) in order to ensure brighter background illumination.
Smartphones, like tablet PCs, are currently conquering the market, especially amongst the
important younger consumer group. In 2010 around 7,702,000 smartphones were sold in
Germany alone, with growth up 161.4% compared to 2009. A relatively short actual service
life of three to four years at the most can be assumed for electronic products such as
smartphones, largely driven by the acquisition of higher-performance and newer generations
of devices. This means that the massive increase in the last three years in the number of
smartphones in the use phase will soon reach the end-of-life stage and therefore the
recycling industry in Germany.
LED lights (use of lamps based on white LEDs) in the private sector are a very new trend.
There are no figures for this segment as relevant studies generally record all white LEDs, i.e.
without distinguishing the application. It is estimated that 21 billion white LEDs were
manufactured in 2009 worldwide (a growth rate of approx. 11% per year). Continuing high
growth rates are expected over the coming years (up to 2020 or 2030). The future market
penetration of LED lights for the important private household area of application will depend
principally on technical (luminous efficacy etc.) and cost factors. Irrespective of these
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