ORIGINAL RESEARCH
Materials Separation from Waste Liquid Crystal
Displays Using Combined Physical Methods
Xuning Zhuang, Wenzhi He, Guangming Li, Juwen Huang, Yingying Ye
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State Key Laboratory of Pollution Control and Resource Reuse, School of Environmental Science and Engineering,
Tongji University, Shanghai, China
Pol. J. Environ. Stud. 2012;21(6):1921-1927
KEYWORDS
ABSTRACT
With the liquid crystal displays (LCDs) being widely used in televisions, notebooks, and mobile phones,
etc., large quantities of LCDs are entering into their end-of-life stage for treatment. If not treated properly, a
loss of resources and undesirable impacts on the environment and human health can occur. In order to treat
the waste LCDs in an efficient and environmentally friendly way, a combined process of physical methods
was proposed to separate and recover materials from waste LCDs in the present study. On the basis of primary
disassembly, two key processes (including liquid crystals removal and the recovery of polarizer and glass)
were studied. Liquid crystals were removed from the panel glass by dissolving in isopropyl alcohol solution
(16.7 vol.%) assisted with ultrasound. Recovery of polarizer and glass was achieved through mechanical
crushing and gravity concentration. Results show that approximately 100 wt.% of liquid crystals were
removed after dissolving for 45 min at 60ºC. Up to 79.7 wt.% of polarizer was separated from glass and its
average content in the recovered product was 90.3 wt.%.