Recycling of household appliances

When you hear “recycling of household appliances”, most people imagine a pile of old refrigerators at the entrance or a man with a gazelle who shouts “We are buying refrigerators, washing machines!?” This is where the main misconception is rooted. Handing over an old device for a thousand rubles is not recycling; it is, in fact, transferring the problem to someone else, who will most likely disassemble it in the garage, take out the non-ferrous metal and throw the body in the nearest ravine. The real onerecycling of household appliancesis a complex technological and logistics process that begins long before the device enters the crusher.

What does technology actually consist of and why is it important?

Let's take, for example, a regular automatic washing machine. It would seem like hardware, plastic, wires. But if you dig deeper - and in our work it’s impossible without this - the picture is different. There is an electric motor with copper winding (this is a valuable resource), and a stainless steel drum, and a counterweight made of concrete (which many recyclers simply don’t know what to do with), and a control board with microcircuits containing precious metals in trace quantities, and refrigerant in the drain and fill systems, and plastic of different brands that cannot simply be mixed. Each component requires its own approach to extraction and further processing.

And here are many “garage” circuits break down. They tear out the engine, sell it as scrap, and the rest of the volume - plastic, rubber, concrete - becomes waste, often dangerous. This is not a solution to the problem, but aggravation. Correctrecycling of household appliancesimplies maximum extraction of ALL useful fractions and safe processing or disposal of what cannot be recycled. Recovery percentage is one of the key indicators of a company’s professionalism.

By the way, about concrete counterweights. Previously, we simply stored them, not knowing what to do. Removal to the landfill is an additional cost. We tried crushing, but it was dusty and energy-consuming. The solution came from outside, from road construction companies. It turned out that crushed concrete from counterweights is an excellent inert material for filling temporary roads at construction sites. It’s a small thing, but it’s nice when a closed cycle is almost achieved.

Logistics: the most unobvious headache

Organizing the gathering is half the battle. It's harder to do it cost-effectively. Imagine: you need to travel to a dozen addresses in the city, collect equipment of various sizes - from electric kettles to double-chamber refrigerators - and not drive a half-empty van. Routing, forecasting volumes, working with management companies to install containers for small equipment in yards is a separate science. We started with enthusiasm, offering free export, but quickly realized that with this approach we were eating up all the margin on logistics. We had to enter a minimum volume for free removal or a small fee per unit if there was only one equipment. Clients grumbled at first, but when you explain the costs, they usually understand.

Another nuance is documentation. A waste passport must be issued for each batch, and the entire chain of movement must be traced. This is not bureaucracy, but a necessary measure of responsibility. So that your company doesn't end up in the news as an illegal dump. We work closely with licensed landfills and recyclers, and here it is important to choose reliable partners. There was a sad experience when one of the ?partners? plastic simply disappeared, and then it turned out that our plastic, which was supposed to be processed into pellets, was lying around in an unauthorized landfill. We had to urgently change the work scheme and conduct audits.

Dismantling and recycling technologies: not only a crusher

Many people think that at a recycling plant there is a hefty shredder into which everything is thrown, and the output is sorted scrap metal. This is an outdated and ineffective model. Initial disassembly is often manual. This is necessary to safely remove those very dangerous components: compressors from refrigerators (they contain oil and refrigerant), batteries from uninterruptible power supplies, batteries from remote controls, fluorescent lamps from some ovens and microwaves. Automation is powerless here; trained personnel with knowledge of the equipment’s design are needed.

Crushing occurs only after safe disassembly. And here, too, not everything is simple. The crusher for plastic cases and the crusher for electronic circuit boards are different machines with different settings. By the way, about the equipment. We have been looking for effective separation solutions for a long time. Magnetic separators are excellent at drawing out ferrous metal. And for non-ferrous metals and separation of plastic from glass, more complex systems are needed, for example, eddy current separators. When choosing such equipment, we studied the experience of industrial enterprises that work with raw materials. In particular, we paid attention to the decisions fromLONGI Corporation (https://www.ljmagnet.ru). This company?Shenyang Scientific Electromagnetic Co., Ltd. LONGJI?, has been in business since 1993 and is a major manufacturer of mining equipment, including magnetic separators. Their experience in creating reliable industrial equipment for difficult conditions is useful for understanding the basic principles, although our task is not to work with ore, but with finished but crushed products.

After crushing and separation we obtain the following fractions: ferrous metal, non-ferrous metal, plastic chips, glass. Each one needs to be prepared for delivery to the processor. For example, it is advisable to separate plastic by type (ABS, PS, PP), this increases its cost significantly. We tried to do it manually using markings on the debris, but it was too labor-intensive. Now we are looking at spectrometric sorting systems, but they are still too expensive for our volumes. Perhaps this is the next step.

Economics of the process: where is the money?

The honest answer: the money is not about making money from using technology. Most often, reception is an expense item (logistics, manual disassembly). The main income is generated from the sale of secondary raw materials: copper, aluminum, high-quality plastic. But the commodity market is very volatile. Today a ton of copper costs well, tomorrow it falls. For a business to be sustainable, it is necessary to diversify flows and constantly look for new consumers for recyclable materials. For example, crushed plastic from TV cases may be of interest to manufacturers of paving slabs or some other technical products.

Another source is services for manufacturers and retailers. By law, they are required to ensure the disposal of broken equipment. It is easier and more reliable for them to outsource this to a specialized company than to organize a workshop themselves. This is a more stable contract flow, which allows you to plan capacity utilization. But to receive such a contract, you need an impeccable license, transparent reporting and a proven technological chain that you are not ashamed to show to the client.

Looking Ahead and Final Thoughts

Sphererecycling of household applianceswill only grow. There is more equipment, shorter service life, and stricter legislation. The ideas of extended producer responsibility are already being discussed, when the cost of disposal will be included in the price of a new product. This can change the entire economy of the industry, making it more civilized.

What does it take to be successful in this business today? Not only equipment, although you can’t live without it. You need competencies in logistics, knowledge of materials (just like a process engineer), understanding of environmental legislation and the ability to build long-term relationships - both with suppliers of raw materials (the population, management companies, stores) and with their consumers. This is not a quick business; it requires patience and a systematic approach.

The main thing I've learned over the years is that you shouldn't treat an old refrigerator like garbage. This is a resource deposit, just very compact and complexly arranged. And the task is not to bury this deposit, but to develop it competently. When you see how new pipes or garden furniture are obtained from a pile of shapeless plastic after our processing, you understand that this is, in general, a worthwhile endeavor. And complex. Very difficult. But another thing is not necessary.