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REEPRODUCE - Dismantling and recycling Rare Earth Elements from End-of-life products for the European Green Transition
Funded by the European Union Grant Agreement N° 101057733 (Horizon Europe, RESILENCE-01-04)
Responsibles:
Participants:
Arbulu, Xabier
Echeverría, Mikel
Granados, Unai
Puy, Imanol
Ricardo, Frank
Ugartemendia, Axier
ABSTRACT
Critical raw materials (CRM) such as neodymium (Nd) and dysprosium (Dy) are essential components used in the production of new electric and electronic equipment. These materials are particularly crucial for the creation of compact and efficient electric motors, which are integral to the functioning of multiple electric and electronic equipment (EEE).
From the point of view of recycling, EEE are very complex products that generally include numerous parts and components (housings, cables, displays, batteries/accumulators, printed circuits, windings, motors, etc.) made of materials of different nature such as metals (ferrous and non-ferrous base, precious and critical), plastics, glass, others (wood, rubber/elastomer, etc.) and their proportion varies significantly between different types or categories of EEE. Therefore, each type of WEEE (Waste EEE) has its own unique characteristics and hence specific needs.
Based on this, the current recycling of WEEE consists of a first dismantling step, usually manually, to remove any hazardous component already listed by the legislation such as batteries, mercury-containing components or capacitors, among others. After this depollution, a sequence of mechanical treatments is carried out to recover, to the maximum, all the valuable and high-volume secondary raw materials, mainly ferrous and non-ferrous metals, copper granulates with precious metals, glass, mixed plastics and printed circuit boards. However, these recycling processes are unable to sort other materials, losing in the cycle critical raw materials such as Neodymiun and Dysprosium.
Focusing on the project and the wastes to be studied, currently, there is no industrial solution available on the market for sorting EoL products containing Nd-based permanent magnets or for the automated dismantling of the components containing Nd-based permanent magnets.
In this context, the aim of the REEPRODUCE is to set up for the first time a sustainable and complete European REEs-recycling value chain at an industrial scale, able to produce REEs from EoL products at a competitive cost and with environmentally friendly technologies for the green strategic sectors.
REEPRODUCE concept
CONTENT
The main goal of CEIT is to research and develop a prototype robotic cell based on force-controlled robots for the disassembly and subsequent recovery of the maximum number of components with Nd-based PMs. The proposed work aims to develop intelligent computer vision (CV) and robotics technologies for the disassembly of industrial components with the aim of recovering critical materials. Therefore, the project has developed a flexible dismantling cell for industrial assembly and disassembly where the combination of robotic, machine vision and AI technologies can address the handling of components in dynamic and unstructured environments, facilitating these operations that today are only possible to carry out manually. The target products have been hoverboards and HDDs.
Robotic cell layout
The proposed hardware structure is based on a high-IP industrial robot with high payload capacity and force/torque control. A 6-axis force/torque sensor with an automatic tool changer has been mounted on the robot flange. An RGBD camera is also installed on the robot head, allowing the robot to perceive the environment. Different types of tools have been acquired so that the robot is able to handle a wide variety of dismantling operations: gripper/claw, suction cups, screwdriver, drill, etc.
Tools used in the process
PAPERS
Journals:
Díaz, I., Borro, D., Iparraguirre, O., Eizaguirre, M., Ricardo, F.A., Muñoz, N., and Gil, J.J., "Robotic system for automated disassembly of electronic waste: Unscrewing", Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing, Vol. 95, No. 103032. October 2025. (url).
VIDEOS
Hoverboard dismantling case for Nd-based permanent magnets recovery (link)
HDD dismantling case Nd-based permanent magnets recovery (link)
Scooter dismantling cases: base for Li-based batteries recovery (link) and wheel for Nd-based permanent magnets recovery (link)
This case (scooter) has been done under the Government of the Basque Country funding (Strategic Hazitek) with EKOMUGI Project (Innovative solutions based on circular economy to reduce raw material consumption in the transport and mobility sector).
RELATED PROJECTS
FABRICARE - Collaborative, safe and intelligent manufacturing through advanced interfaces, robotics and digital twins
Funded by CDTI (Red Cervera)
Responsibles:
Participants:
Aguinaga, Iker
Amundarain, Aiert
Alberdi, Helene
Bustamante, Paul
De Celis, Guillermo
Echeverría, Mikel
Granados, Unai
Hernandez, Diana
Ricardo, Frank
Ugartemendia, Axier
Velez, Igone
Zamora, Leticia
ABSTRACT
FABRICARE is a project focused on conducting research that represents progress with respect to the international state of the art in four technologies related to smart manufacturing in collaborative environments: digital twins, human-machine interfaces, collaborative robotics, and mobile robotics. FABRICARE's mission is to optimize current manufacturing processes by implementing collaborative and mobile robotics, as well as advanced perception systems that ensure safety. These elements will be integrated into a digital twin modeling and simulation platform. This platform will allow not only the production process to be simulated and analyzed in advance, but also to monitor and control it in real time. To facilitate interaction with this platform, advanced interfaces will be developed using various technologies. The consortium is composed of 5 research centers (CEIT, TECNALIA, IKERLAN, CTC and AIDIMME) coordinated by CEIT.
CONTENT
The CEIT Technology Center Association (www.ceit.es) is a non-profit multidisciplinary research center. It was founded by the University of Navarra in 1982 with the dual objective of developing R&D projects with companies and promoting the dissemination of knowledge through doctoral theses and scientific publications. CEIT will collaborate on the project with the "Intelligent Systems for Industry 4.0" (SSI40) group of the Information and Communication Technologies Division. This group of more than 40 researchers emerges from the union of different lines of research aimed at designing systems that enable the productive industry to join the fourth industrial revolution.
The development of virtual, augmented reality, and haptic technologies that enable advanced Human-Machine Interfaces
The development of virtual digital twins for the modeling, analysis, and evaluation of alternatives, as well as for the monitoring and control of the real process
Intelligent control systems for collaborative robotics, including artificial vision systems to provide robot perception
Mobile robotics with the design of indoor and outdoor positioning systems, using methods that combine optical technologies with others such as Ultra Wide Band (UWB)
PAPERS
Journals:
Díaz, I., Borro, D., Iparraguirre, O., Eizaguirre, M., Ricardo, F.A., Muñoz, N., and Gil, J.J., "Robotic system for automated disassembly of electronic waste: Unscrewing", Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing, Vol. 95, No. 103032. October 2025. (url).
VIDEOS
RELATED PROJECTS
RECAL - Recycling technologies for circular Aluminium
Funded by the European Union Grant Agreement Nº 101138747 (Horizon Europe, TT-01-42)
Responsibles:
Participants:
Arbulu, Xabier
Echeverría, Mikel
Granados, Unai
Puy, Imanol
Ricardo, Frank
Ugartemendia, Axier
ABSTRACT
This project is developing advanced recycling and digital technologies to facilitate a circular aluminium economy, enabled by the proposed RecAL Hub, a digital cockpit tracking Al-recyclates across the continent, connecting suppliers with buyers. In this way, RecAL will address critical challenges in the industry to usher in a new era of sustainable production – and reuse – for the metal. One of the driving forces behind RecAL is the advancement of a complementary set of up- and recycling technologies inkeeping with circular economy principles. RecAL’s innovations across the aluminium value chain will achieve a variety of goals, such as improvements to the capture, separation, and reuse of aluminium recyclates plus the ongoing development of more sustainable designs. Ultimately, RecAL’s new technologies will be showcased via three linked use-case demonstrations. This action will aim to resemble and quantify the impact on future closed value chains from EoL-procurement to remanufacturing.
CONTENT
The disassembly of an End-of-Life aircraft is as follows: First all parts dedicated for reuse in the aerospace industry need to be disassembled out of the aircraft. Second all interiors, covering, linings as well as wiring, tubing etc. are dismantled. Some of these products can be reused in the non-aerospace industry, for instance to make mock-ups. Currently, the final step is the scrapping of the airframe. A recycling partner will cut the aircraft into smaller pieces and transport it to its own recycling location. There the aircraft remains are shredded and sorted by using different methods. The different types of aluminium alloys are not separated and the resulting aluminium alloy mixture is sold to a melter as secondary aluminium.
Concerning to CEIT's work (the use of robotics for an intelligent dismantling), such dismantling systems will be based on robotics and artificial vision (deep learning) not to only perform a brute cut of the targeted location, but also to perform unscrewing and housing removal to obtain the targeted elements with different alloy. In order for the robots to understand and settle the trajectory planning of the action to perform (clamping, grasping, cutting, un/screwing-peg-in-hole), reinforcement learning and/or other intelligent approaches can be used because of its adaptability, flexibility and optimization capacity.
After all reuseable parts are removed from an End-of Life aircraft, the aircraft is cut into pieces and shipped to a recycling company. This recycling company separates the aluminium from the other materials like steel, plastic and titanium. During this recycling process no additional separation of the aluminium into different alloys is done. At the moment, this additional separation process is more expensive than the separate alloys generate as additional revenue.
With this study an improvement is possible in the current situation. By separating the different types of alloys already during the cutting process at AELS the aircraft will be handed over to the recycling company with the different alloys already sorted. Separating the aircraft, removing all the rivets, by hand would be a lot of additional manual labor and can become dangerous. By creating a robot that will do the work for us, the additional revenue can increase without needing extra manpower.
Aeronautic panel
Aeronautic panel
Robotic cell
Robotic cell
RELATED PROJECTS
RECAL website
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