Deep processing: what happens after the module has been dismantled
Dismantling produces fractions. Deep processing turns those fractions into products — or into a cost. This section covers the four routes that matter
01
The four inputs
- 01
What the front end produces
A clean cell concentrate supports a chemical route. A mixed fraction with polymer still attached needs thermal treatment first. A glass-rich stream with encapsulant residue needs delamination. The upstream line decides which of these you have.
- 02
What your buyer will accept
This is the single most useful unknown to resolve. A float-glass processor, an aggregate user and a metal refiner each impose a different specification, and the specification decides how far down the processing chain you have to go.
- 03
Site, utilities and permit
Thermal and chemical routes need far more than floor space: abatement, effluent handling, fire and gas safety, reagent storage and a permit that covers all of it. If the permit cannot be obtained, the route does not exist.
- 04
Operating capability
A chemical route rewards discipline and punishes improvisation. Be honest about the laboratory, the instruments, the maintenance and the trained operators you can keep. A simpler route run well beats a sophisticated route run badly.
02
Route selection at a glance
| If this is your situation | The route that fits | Because |
|---|---|---|
| Clean aluminium and glass have buyers; the mixed fraction can be sold or stored | Mechanical separation only | No further treatment pays for itself |
| A glass buyer rejects cullet with encapsulant residue | Tunnel-kiln delamination | Drives the polymer off before the glass is graded |
| Polymer has no outlet and the mixed fraction is a disposal cost | Pyrolysis | Converts the polymer into gas and oil and leaves a cleaner solid |
| Frames are removed intact and a remelt operation is within reach | Aluminium melting line | Turns a scrap stream into secondary metal |
| You can produce a separated cell concentrate and want a metal product | Silver recovery | The only route where the cell fraction becomes a defined product |
| You have neither the permit nor the laboratory for chemistry | Stop at mechanical plus thermal | A chemical route without process control produces effluent, not product |
03
The routes as a drawing
04
The costs people forget
- Abatement. Any thermal route produces an off-gas that has to be treated. The extraction and cleaning train is often comparable in cost to the process equipment.
- Effluent. A leaching route produces liquid waste that has to be neutralised, treated and permitted — and in many jurisdictions that single line item decides whether the project happens.
- Assay and laboratory. Without the ability to measure what is in your feed and your product, you cannot sell on specification and you cannot prove a permit condition.
- Reagent logistics. Acids, alkalis and reductants have to be delivered, stored safely and consumed at a controlled rate. In remote locations this is a project risk, not a consumable.
- Fire and gas safety. Pyrolysis produces combustible gas. The safety case, the instrumentation and the operator training are part of the scope.
- Dust. Thermal residue is fine and easily airborne. Containment has to be designed in, not added after the first complaint.
05
A rational build order
Almost every plant we are asked about is better built in stages rather than in one step, because each stage proves the next one and generates the cash to fund it.
Stage one: dismantling. Produce aluminium and glass cleanly, weigh every stream, and learn what your feedstock actually is. Stage two: separation, sizing to your buyer's specification. Stage three: thermal treatment, if and only if the polymer is blocking a sale. Stage four: hydrometallurgy, when you have a concentrate and a place to sell the metal.
Each stage is also a checkpoint. If stage two shows you cannot produce a consistent concentrate, stage four was never going to work — and you have learned that for the price of stage two.
Send us the four inputs
What your line produces, what your buyer accepts, what your site and permit allow, and what you can operate. We will tell you which route is worth pursuing and which is not.
FAQ
Questions
Should I build the whole chain at once?
Rarely. Building in stages lets each step prove the next one and generates the cash for it. It also limits the cost of learning that your feedstock or your market will not support a chemical route.
Is pyrolysis always better than mechanical separation?
No. Mechanical separation is cheaper, simpler and has a far lower permit burden. Pyrolysis earns its place only when the polymer fraction has to be removed to meet a specification or when there is no outlet for it at all.
What is the biggest reason deep-processing projects fail?
Permitting and effluent, not equipment. Thermal and chemical routes are usually technically feasible; the question is whether the site can obtain and sustain the permit, and whether the operator can run the process to spec every day.
Do you supply a complete turnkey deep-processing plant?
We supply the equipment and the process configuration, and we commission it. Reagents, effluent treatment design, permitting and the assay programme are project-specific and are developed with your own advisors and regulator — we will tell you plainly where our scope ends.
Send us the module mix and the through-put
Tell us what arrives at your gate and what has to leave. The engineering team replies with the station configuration, the scope boundary and the information still missing before drawings start.
- Modules — framed single-glass, double-glass, frameless, thin film, mixed
- Condition — intact, or a meaningful share damaged or bent
- Through-put — modules per hour or t/h, and your shift pattern
- Output — which fractions you sell or store, and to what specification
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