Advanced recovery of critical raw materials from Waste from Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE)

Expected Outcome

Project results are expected to contribute to all of the following expected outcomes:

• improved collection, sorting and recycling technologies that enhance significantly the recovery rates of strategic and critical raw materials from waste from electrical and electronic equipment, reducing the dependence on imported secondary and primary materials, and mitigating the climate and environmental impacts associated with their extraction, including biodiversity loss, by reducing the need for primary raw material extraction and minimising waste;
• strengthened waste market creation through the development of economically viable and environmentally sound recovery and recycling practices and technologies, with a particular emphasis on secondary strategic raw materials of lower costs and sufficiently high quality and/or purity, promoting a circular economy for electrical and electronic equipment.

Scope

As Europe seeks to reduce its dependence on imported critical raw materials and mitigate climate and environmental impacts from extraction, there is a pressing need for innovative and economically viable recycling processes. With the rapid increase in electronic waste, improving recycling technologies is essential to support the EU's transition to a circular economy. The topic addresses an urgent need to enhance the recovery and recycling of critical raw materials (CRMs) from Waste from Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) due to the increasing global demand for these materials, which are essential for various high-tech and green technologies.

Proposals should:

• develop new and/or improve existing scalable processes and technologies (including AI, where relevant, and exploring innovative recovery and recycling methods – possibly bio-based, bio-inspired, or other breakthrough technologies) to efficiently collect, sort, recover and recycle strategic and critical raw materials including single components from electrical and electronic equipment waste, such as rare earth elements, precious metals and other valuable materials vital for the green and digital transitions, as well as possibly for EU aerospace and defence;
• develop standards, technologies and processes, that demonstrate how to ensure the quality, cost and safety of recycled strategic and critical raw materials for the creation of an economically viable and sustainable waste market, thus reducing the environmental footprint of such processes, supporting biodiversity preservation and sustainable consumption, optimising the efficiency and effectiveness, including by improved automatisation and synergies of recovering multiple CRMs, bringing down costs and time while ensuring that EU’s secondary raw materials can be competitive against imported primary and secondary materials.

The topic supports EU policies, particularly the European Green Deal, the EU Circular Economy Act, the Clean Industrial Deal, the Critical Raw Materials Act, the Waste from Electrical and Electronic Waste Directive, the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation (ESPR) and Europe’s efforts to develop a single market for sustainable products. Synergies with Cluster 4, the European Partnership on Raw Materials and ongoing Cluster 6 projects are encouraged.

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Activities are expected to achieve TRL 4-5 by the end of the project – see General Annex B. Activities may start at any TRL.