Sustainable gold: a quantum leap in urban mining

Private investors are increasingly turning to climate and environmentally friendly investments in an effort to build their wealth in a more sustainable way. The traditional mining production of gold leaves a large ecological footprint – with CO2 emissions that can be reduced to one twentieth through recycling. While, for a long time now, the recycling rate for scrap gold from jewellery has been a solid 100 per cent, the situation is different for urban mining, i. e. the extraction of gold from e-waste. The considerable potential for expansion in this area may soon be fully realised thanks to innovative technology.

Gold ions can be dissolved from PC circuit boards using whey

As described in their study “Gold Recovery from E-Waste by Food-Waste Amyloid Aerogels” published in the scientific journal Advanced Materials in late January 2024, scientists at ETH Zurich have succeeded in recovering gold from computer circuit boards or smartphones in a way that is both simple and environmentally friendly by using a waste product from cheese production, protein fibre-rich whey – and at a price 50 times lower than the value of the gold recovered this way. One problem with urban mining to date has been the considerable cost, which renders complete recovery of the gold in e-waste unprofitable. This could change once the technology, which has so far only been tested in the laboratory, is ready for the market, where it could increase the recycling rate in gold production.

Xetra-Gold: sustainable gold also available for securitised deliveries

Climate-conscious investors do not necessarily have to buy specially recycled gold in order to invest sustainably. A good example is the exchange-traded commodity Xetra-Gold, which securitises the right for every buyer to convert it into a corresponding amount of physical gold. Xetra-Gold is issued by Deutsche Börse Commodities – a company which publishes an annual sustainability report and is committed to the principles of sustainability. The implementation of ESG criteria is not limited to the company alone: the gold bars delivered at the investor’s request are sourced from the precious metals and recycling specialist Umicore, whose bullions consist mainly of recycled gold.