ABSTRACT
The wealth of the society depends on a number of metals, including base metals, precious
metals and increasingly rare earth elements (REE), collectively termed technology metals.
Numerous applications stimulated the use of the technology metals, and their supply is at stake,
owing to the high demand and uneven geographical distribution of these metals. Their stable
supply is crucial for the well-being of the society and the transition to a sustainable, circular
economy. There is an increasing interest in secondary sources of these metals. This chapter
reviews the state of electronic waste, its management and latest technological developments in
metal recovery from various streams of electronic waste. An emphasis was given to printed
circuit boards (PCB), hard disc drives (HDD) and displays with regard to their detailed material
content. Recovery technologies such as physical, pyrometallurgical and hydrometallurgical
methods were overviewed respective to their level of technological readiness level (TRL).
