Recovery Considerations in the Pyrometallurgical Recycling of Used Beverage Cans

In a world striving for the conservation of natural resources, metal recycling is an essential component of sustainable resource management. Continuous scientific research into the parameters controlling the recovery rates of the applied metallurgical treatments both promotes technological advancements in the design of high-efficiency resilient processes and enables their optimization at the implementation phase. In this work, a series of lab-scale testing data was generated to study the relationship between the delacquering degree and recovery rate in the pyrometallurgical recycling of Used Beverage Cans (UBCs). The effect of the atmosphere on thermal delacquering kinetics was studied. The obtained Temperature-Delacquering Degree correlation was utilized to prepare UBC samples of varying delacquering degrees, which were subsequently melted by two procedures: direct melting and addition into AA3104 hot heel. Assessment of metal recovery employing different methodologies, including cast metal weight and separation of entrapped aluminium in the dross, both mechanically and after re-melting, demonstrated key affecting parameters.