Electronic waste is the world’s fastest growing waste problem. Instead of burning it to recover gold and copper, a new method separates the components for reuse. Replacing the epoxy in printed circuit boards with a type of plastic known as a vitrimer which flows and forms new, strong chemical bonds when heated past a certain temperature that allows them to be recycled, unlike the plastic in water bottles that degrade with each recycling cycle.
ww.washington.edu/news/2024/04/26/recyclable-circuit-boards-vitrimer-pcb-e-waste