Technical Articles From Université de Lorraine

Non-Destructive Characterization of Mechanically Processed Waste Printed Circuit Boards: X-ray Fluorescence Spectroscopy and Prompt Gamma Activation Analysis

May 28, 2024 | Akira Otsuki , Pedro Pereira Gonçalves , Christian Stieghorst and Zsolt Révay

This work aimed to characterize the deportment/concentration and liberation/association
of the metals and light elements within mechanically processed waste printed circuit boards (PCBs)
that hold the complex and heterogeneous structure and distribution of different material components.
Waste PCBs passed through a series of mechanical processing (i.e., comminution and sieving) for
metal recovery and were then characterized without further destroying the particles in order to
capture their heterogeneity. The characterizations were performed in a laboratory and large-scale
neutron facility. The results obtained with a portable X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy and prompt
gamma activation analysis were compared and confirmed the good agreement and complementarities
in general. The advantages and disadvantages of the two different methods were identified and
discussed in this paper, in relation to their application to the analysis of mechanically processed
PCB particles.