Study: The value of metal materials in discarded mobile phones in Germany is 240 million euros
A recent study has found that the metals in discarded mobile phones in Germany are enough to cover the resource requirements of smartphones for the next 10 years - in purely computational terms.
The study, conducted by the Institute of German Economics in Cologne and published its results today, estimated the value of the total metal materials in mobile phones that were disposed of in Germany at about 240 million euros.
The study estimated the value of metallic materials in smartphones sold in Germany during 2021 at 23.5 million euros.
In pure mathematical terms, phones that are no longer in use can cover the resource requirements of new smartphones for more than 10 years.
However, the study authors pointed out that the reality is different, "because not all unused mobile phones are recycled, just as not all phones are completely recycled."
Discarded cell phones are part of what is called the urban mine, as a storehouse of raw materials within already used products.
"It is very difficult to estimate what kind of raw materials will return to us, and how and when," said Britta Bockhagen of the German Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources.
Buckhagen explained that it is not clear at the same time how much steel or aluminum was used in the production of a car or a washing machine 50 years ago, or how to recover and treat it optimally, noting that better data is needed in this field.
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