Environmentally appropriate and efficient recycling of several materials contained in waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) requires knowledge and the identification of materials and chemical elements forming this kind of waste. Therefore, this study presents the physical and chemical characterization of desktop computer waste and the potential recycling rates of these materials. Differently from other studies, which investigated recycling and chemical composition only of motherboards (the component that contains precious metals), here were evaluate all components, namely floppy disk drives, CD drives, IDE cables, HDs, coolers, motherboards, power supply units, lids, casings, and other parts. This study was carried out in three steps: (i) the physical characterization included the manual dismantling of these components, and grouping the materials under seven categories (plastics, non-ferrous metals, ferrous metals, materials with substances of interest, hazardous materials, wires and cables, and other materials); (ii) potential recycling rates were calculated according to the European Directive 2102/19/EU; (iii) chemical characterization of components based on X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy. The results showed that the potential recycling rate of the waste analyzed was 96.66%, which represents the amount of material that can be recycled in the samples investigated. The results also show that, besides motherboards, other components also are potentially recyclable. Noble, precious, and critical metals as well as and rare earth elements were detected in IDE cables, power supply units, hard disks, floppy disk drives, and motherboards. Parts with high levels of aluminum, copper, and zinc were also observed. Recycling of WEEE is important both economically and environmentally, since PC components, since these elements may be recycled in processes that use less energy, preventing the extraction of natural raw materials and minimizing environmental impact.

对电气和电子废设备（WEEE）中包含的几种材料进行环境适当和有效的回收需要知识和对构成此类废物的材料和化学元素的识别。因此，本研究介绍了台式计算机废物的物理和化学特性以及这些材料的潜在回收率。与仅研究主板（包含贵金属的组件）的回收利用和化学成分的其他研究不同，这里评估所有组件，包括软盘驱动器，CD驱动器，IDE电缆，HD，冷却器，主板，电源设备，盖子，机壳和其他零件。这项研究分三个步骤进行：（i）物理特征包括手动拆卸这些组件，将材料归为七类（塑料，有色金属，黑色金属，含有关注物质的材料，危险材料，电线和电缆以及其他材料）；（ii）潜在的回收率是根据欧洲指令2102/19 / EU计算的；（iii）基于X射线荧光光谱法对成分进行化学表征。结果表明，所分析废物的潜在回收率为96.66％，代表了所研究样品中可以回收的材料量。结果还表明，除了主板以外，其他组件也可能是可回收的。在IDE电缆，电源设备，硬盘，软盘驱动器和母板中检测到贵金属，贵重金属和关键金属以及稀土元素。还观察到铝，铜和锌含量高的零件。WEEE的回收在经济和环境方面都非常重要，因为PC组件由于可以在消耗较少能量的过程中回收这些元素，从而防止了天然原料的提取并最大程度地减少了对环境的影响。