New technology dramatically increases the recovery rate of precious metals from waste

In South Korea, which relies on imports for 99.3% of its metal resources, the per capita consumption of those metal resources is the highest in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, and consumption of precious metals in industries such as renewable energy, healthcare and semiconductors is increasing. Gold is in demand for applications such as batteries, electric vehicles and renewable energy in the electric and electronic industries, but is a big variable in the industry due to its limited availability and high cost. Thus, research on urban mining, which extracts precious metals from waste, is being actively conducted around the world. However, most of the technologies for extracting high-purity gold from waste resources require large amounts of chemicals and high operating temperatures; therefore, it has regulatory and efficiency problems.