Metal Recycling Technologies from Fly-Ashes by the Metal Mining Agency of Japan

In Japan, the municipal solid waste, which amounts to 50 million tons, is generated every year and most of it is incinerated. The bottom and fly ashes are disposed to the registered disposal areas under the provisions of The Waste Disposal and Public Cleaning Law. Especially, as the fly ash from the municipal waste incineration (the primary fly ash) contains heavy metals (lead, zinc, etc) and dioxins, it cannot be disposed directly without decontamination, such as moiling, cementation, chelating and dissolving processes provided in the law. However, these procedures for decontamination, except melting, are not enough for dioxins. Even in case of melting, the fly ash from the process (the secondary fly ash) contains high concentration of heavy metals (e.g., Zn; 1-20%, Pb; 1-10%). For these reasons, Metal Mining Agency of Japan (MMAJ), a governmental organization, started a four-year project to develop the treatment technologies of these fly ashes in 1999. The purpose of the project is to establish the integrated technologies to recover the valuable metals from, and to decontaminate, the primary and secondary fly-ashes in the practical scale by utilizing the existing metallurgical processes and facilities, along with the energy saving and the reduction of the environmental impact.