Mitsubishi Materials Group collects valuable metals from used home appliances, such as air conditioners, refrigerators, TVs, and washing machines, and makes them usable again as metal resources.
We will introduce two Group companies that play a role in this area through their involvement in the recycling of discarded home appliances.

The need for recyclable materials is increasing amidst the advancement of the transition to a circular economy. In order to respond to this need and provide the added value of traceability, Mitsubishi Materials is accelerating its initiatives with home appliance recycling plants within its Group as well as Materials Eco-Refining Co., Ltd., which performs the role of a trading company.
We will begin this initiative with copper as our first target. The copper is sold to external recyclers after being collected at home appliance recycling plants. Until now, it was not known how copper was recycled and used in the final products and components after being sold to these external recyclers. Mitsubishi Materials will establish the “resource recycling loop,” which recycles the copper at its copper smelters, refineries, and wrought copper plants, manufactures products using it, and again supplies it to society, creating a structure that can stably supply traceable copper.

Chubu Eco Technology is working to increase the recovery rate of copper in the recycling process for the entire Mitsubishi Materials Group. Copper is used for copper tubing for air conditioners and power cords for various home appliances as well as for motors and circuit boards (discarded circuit boards become E-Scrap).
We disassemble home appliances and collect copper and copper components from them.
Our mission is to steadily deliver copper containing components that we have collected to Mitsubishi Materials and establish a resource recycling route for the Group. As we have traditional  sales channels outside of the Group, we have not been able to deliver all of the copper to Mitsubishi Materials. Under these circumstances, we have been working with Materials Eco-Refining Co., Ltd. and other companies to steadily carry out initiatives for establishing a recycling structure to further increase the volume of copper that we deliver to Naoshima Smelter & Refinery.
In addition, we have been strengthening our copper collection by proactively proceeding with equipment improvements. For example, we have improved our copper recovery rate by improving the color sorting process.
As Japan has limited natural resources, it is necessary to col- lect resources, such as metal and resin, from urban mines. We have proactively introduced the latest technologies and fulfilled our role as a place for testing recycling technologies. Through our day-to-day operations, we would like to play a part in a recycling-oriented society and embody our commitment: “For People, Society and the Earth.”

East Japan Recycling Systems Co., Ltd. disassembles home appliances manually and with machines and collects resources such as metal, but the workload of manually removing and carrying heavy objects was a challenge. By replacing manual labor with robots, we are aiming to enhance efficiency and maintain high productivity.
One task with a significant workload is the disassembly of air conditioner condenser units. On the high end, about 350 compressors, each weighing around 9 kg, are moved manually to the collection containers for this task. In terms of weight transported, this means that approximately a total of 3 tons are carried manually, which is a significant burden. Under an initiative from Mitsubishi Materials’ Head Office, we are planning to introduce equipment that automatically disassembles and collects compressors using robots. This automatic disassembly equipment does not only move compressors, but also automatically unscrews the bolts in compressors. The equipment applies image recogni- tion technology from automatic screw removers for flat-screen TVs.
Reducing the workload with this equipment will enable us to carry out work in an even safer manner and further increase productivity.
Nowadays, amidst society’s demand for resource recycling, our company hopes to provide value to society by leveraging the recycling technologies we have cultivated. We will carry out our day-to-day work while keeping in mind our commitment of “circulating resources for a sustainable future” and work to accelerate a circular economy.