Substance Flow Analysis of Heavy Metals' Recycling - How to deal with Decreasing Markets

Environmental problems related to heavy metals have a long history. Heavy metals have toxic properties, leading to adverse effects on human and ecosystem health even in small doses. Another problem-causing property is their non-degradability: once they enter the environment they will remain there for a long time. Metals tend to accumulate in soils and sediments, with immobilisation due only to geological, and therefore extremely slow, processes. Accumulation in the food chain may lead to an increased stock in biota, thereby magnifying the human dose. A number of problems in the past have given rise to policies restricting the use of these metals on the one hand, and close their economic cycles on the other hand. Recycling is an important part of these policies. On the one hand, recycling prevents waste; on the other hand, it reduces the need for using virgin materials. For a number of metals, recycling has been upped to include the major part of the waste stream. In most cases, there is no difference in quality between secondary and primary produced metals.