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Extracting Pure Gold: Turning Electronic Waste into Treasure

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Tuesday, April 23, 2024

Researchers at KIST have developed a fiber-based adsorbent capable of recovering gold from electronic waste with over 99.9% efficiency. Credit: SciTechDaily.com A fibrous adsorbent selectively recovers high-purity gold from waste. Dramatically reduces the cost and time of the recovery process and enables material to be mass-produced and repeatedly recycled.Korea relies on imports for most of its metal resources, and in recent years, due to resource depletion and rising raw material prices, ‘circular resources’ that recycle waste metal resources have emerged.In response, SK hynix has established a mid- to long-term plan to increase the percentage of copper, gold, etc. recovered and reused from waste generated in the semiconductor manufacturing process to more than 30% by 2030, and Samsung Electronics is running a collection program for used mobile phones in cooperation with E-circulation Governance, a non-profit corporation. The global circular economy market is expected to more than double in size from approximately $338 billion in 2022 to approximately $712 billion in 2026. Figure 1. Preparation and physicochemical characteristics of the aminated polyacrylonitrile fibers (PANFs). Representative illustrations of PANF (a) before and after coupling reaction of various alkylamine molecules. Different colors of PANF and amine-laden polymeric fiber (ALPF) represent different functional groups of nitrile and alkylamines. (b) FT-IR spectra of PANF before and after coupling reaction of different alkylamines using diethylenetriamine (DETA), triethylenetetramine (TETA), tetraethylenepentamine (TEPA), and branched poly(ethyleneimine) (bPEI). (c) XRD patterns of the PANF and aminated PANFs. (d) Stress-strain curves of the PANF and aminated PANFs. (e) Maximum adsorption capacity (qm) of the aminated PANFs for Au(III) ions. Initial concentration (Ci) and pH value of the Au solution were 1000 mg/L and 1, respectively. Credit: Korea Institute of Science and TechnologyBreakthrough in Metal Recovery TechnologyIn this context, a team led by Dr. Jae-Woo Choi of the Water Resource Cycle Research Center at the Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST) announced that they have developed a technology that can selectively recover high-purity gold from electrical and electronic waste containing various metals using textile materials.Adsorbents for metal recovery are generally granular in shape to increase adsorption efficiency based on high specific surface area, but they are difficult to control underwater, resulting in low recovery rates and even secondary environmental pollution. On the other hand, fiber-like materials are easy to control underwater and can be made into various shapes through the weaving process, so they have high potential for industrial application. However, due to their thin thickness and low strength, they are easily broken when gold recovery is applied to the support.Figure 2. Au recovery performance of the ALPF. (a) Effect of pH in Au solution on the Au recovery performance of the ALPF. Ci, t, and adsorbent doses were 100 mg/L, 24 h, and 0.5 g/L, respectively. FESEM images of the ALPF surface after Au recovery at pH of (b) 3, (c) 6, (d) 9, and (e) 12, showing the Au(0) particles on the ALPF surface. Scale bar is 1 μm. (f) XRD patterns of the ALPF after Au recovery in the pH range of 2-12. (g-l) FESEM images of the ALPF after Au recovery at Ci of (g) 0.1, (h) 1, (i) 10, (j) 100, (k) 500, and (l) 1000 mg/L for 24 h with stirring at 200 rpm. pH was adjusted to 1. Scale bar is 20 μm. (m-q) FESEM-EDS mapping of the chemical elements distributions for the ALPF after Au recovery at Ci of 1000 mg/L: (m) overlap, (n) carbon, (o) nitrogen, (p) oxygen, and (q) gold. Scale bar is 20 μm. (r) Recovery efficiencies of the ALPF for Au recovery in a low Ci range of 0.1-100 mg/L. (s) Adsorption isotherm test result of the ALPF adsorbent. The experimentally obtained data were fitted by three representative isotherm equations of Langmuir, Freundlich, and Sips models. (t) Comparison of qm and optimum pH value for the ALPF adsorbent with those of the adsorbents best reported in the literature, classified by the adsorbent size (nano, micro, and milliscale) or shape (particle and fiber). Credit: Korea Institute of Science and TechnologyEnhanced Gold Recovery TechniquesKIST researchers have chemically immobilized alkaline molecules on the surface of polyacrylonitrile (PANF) fibers to improve both molecular gold recovery performance and structural stability. The amine-containing polymer fiber has a dramatically larger surface area, which can improve the adsorption performance of gold ions (Au) in waste by up to 2.5 times (from 576 mg/g to 1,462 mg/g) compared to the team’s previously developed granular gold adsorption material.The developed fibrous adsorbent not only showed a gold recovery efficiency of more than 99.9% in solutions obtained by leaching real CPUs, but also achieved a gold recovery efficiency close to 100% in a wide range of pH 1-4, which includes most waste liquids. It is particularly noteworthy that only gold ions can be recovered with a high purity of over 99.9%, even in the presence of 14 other metal ions coexisting in the solution. Furthermore, the gold recovery rate was maintained at 91% even after 10 uses, demonstrating excellent reusability.Figure 3. Applicability of the ALPF adsorbent for Au recovery processes. (a) Adsorption selectivity of the ALPF for Au(III) in the presence of coexisting metal ions including Cu(II), Pb(II), Cd(II), Mn(II), Ni(II), Co(II), Fe(II), Al(III), Cr(III), Zn(II), Na(I), K(I), Mg(II), and Ca(II). Ci of Au(III) was set to 10 mg/L, and those of other metal ions were set to 10, 100, and 1000 mg/L. Solution pH was adjusted to 1. (b) Purity of the recovered Au(0) by the ALPF. Inset shows an optical microscope image of the recovered Au(0). (c) Repetitive adsorption/desorption test of Au(III) using the ALPF adsorbent. Ci of Au(III) was set to 10 mg/L. Adsorption process was conducted for 24 h. Solution pH was adjusted to 1. Desorption process was conducted for 24 h using 0.5 acidic thiourea solution in 1.0 M HCl. (d) Deconvoluted HRXPS spectra of the ALPF for N 1s, showing the chemical change for amine groups of the ALPF adsorbent during the repetitive adsorption-desorption cycles. (e) Photograph of felts consisting of PANF (top) and ALPF (bottom), indicating that the fibrous adsorbent can be transformed into a desired shape. Scale bar is 2 cm. (f) Effect of the adsorbent shapes on the pressure drop in a column filled with the adsorbents. Each pressure drop in the column filled with the adsorbents was measured according to the volumetric flow rate. Credit: Korea Institute of Science and TechnologyConclusion and Future Prospects“By enabling efficient and eco-friendly metal resource recovery, the fiber-type adsorbent developed by KIST can reduce Korea’s dependence on resource imports and prepare for the risk of rising raw material prices,” said Dr. Jae-Woo Choi. “We plan to expand the scope of future research to selectively recover various target metals in addition to gold, said Dr. Youngkyun Jung.”Reference: “Efficient and selective gold recovery using amine-laden polymeric fibers synthesized by a steric hindrance strategy” by Youngkyun Jung, Su-Jin Yoon, Kyung-Won Jung and Jae-Woo Choi, 12 February 2024, Chemical Engineering Journal.DOI: 10.1016/j.cej.2024.149602

A fibrous adsorbent selectively recovers high-purity gold from waste. Dramatically reduces the cost and time of the recovery process and enables material to be mass-produced...

Extracting Gold Electronic Waste Concept Art

Researchers at KIST have developed a fiber-based adsorbent capable of recovering gold from electronic waste with over 99.9% efficiency. Credit: SciTechDaily.com

A fibrous adsorbent selectively recovers high-purity gold from waste. Dramatically reduces the cost and time of the recovery process and enables material to be mass-produced and repeatedly recycled.

Korea relies on imports for most of its metal resources, and in recent years, due to resource depletion and rising raw material prices, ‘circular resources’ that recycle waste metal resources have emerged.

In response, SK hynix has established a mid- to long-term plan to increase the percentage of copper, gold, etc. recovered and reused from waste generated in the semiconductor manufacturing process to more than 30% by 2030, and Samsung Electronics is running a collection program for used mobile phones in cooperation with E-circulation Governance, a non-profit corporation. The global circular economy market is expected to more than double in size from approximately $338 billion in 2022 to approximately $712 billion in 2026.

Extracting High-Purity Gold Figure 1

Figure 1. Preparation and physicochemical characteristics of the aminated polyacrylonitrile fibers (PANFs). Representative illustrations of PANF (a) before and after coupling reaction of various alkylamine molecules. Different colors of PANF and amine-laden polymeric fiber (ALPF) represent different functional groups of nitrile and alkylamines. (b) FT-IR spectra of PANF before and after coupling reaction of different alkylamines using diethylenetriamine (DETA), triethylenetetramine (TETA), tetraethylenepentamine (TEPA), and branched poly(ethyleneimine) (bPEI). (c) XRD patterns of the PANF and aminated PANFs. (d) Stress-strain curves of the PANF and aminated PANFs. (e) Maximum adsorption capacity (qm) of the aminated PANFs for Au(III) ions. Initial concentration (Ci) and pH value of the Au solution were 1000 mg/L and 1, respectively. Credit: Korea Institute of Science and Technology

Breakthrough in Metal Recovery Technology

In this context, a team led by Dr. Jae-Woo Choi of the Water Resource Cycle Research Center at the Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST) announced that they have developed a technology that can selectively recover high-purity gold from electrical and electronic waste containing various metals using textile materials.

Adsorbents for metal recovery are generally granular in shape to increase adsorption efficiency based on high specific surface area, but they are difficult to control underwater, resulting in low recovery rates and even secondary environmental pollution. On the other hand, fiber-like materials are easy to control underwater and can be made into various shapes through the weaving process, so they have high potential for industrial application. However, due to their thin thickness and low strength, they are easily broken when gold recovery is applied to the support.

Extracting High-Purity Gold Figure 2

Figure 2. Au recovery performance of the ALPF. (a) Effect of pH in Au solution on the Au recovery performance of the ALPF. Ci, t, and adsorbent doses were 100 mg/L, 24 h, and 0.5 g/L, respectively. FESEM images of the ALPF surface after Au recovery at pH of (b) 3, (c) 6, (d) 9, and (e) 12, showing the Au(0) particles on the ALPF surface. Scale bar is 1 μm. (f) XRD patterns of the ALPF after Au recovery in the pH range of 2-12. (g-l) FESEM images of the ALPF after Au recovery at Ci of (g) 0.1, (h) 1, (i) 10, (j) 100, (k) 500, and (l) 1000 mg/L for 24 h with stirring at 200 rpm. pH was adjusted to 1. Scale bar is 20 μm. (m-q) FESEM-EDS mapping of the chemical elements distributions for the ALPF after Au recovery at Ci of 1000 mg/L: (m) overlap, (n) carbon, (o) nitrogen, (p) oxygen, and (q) gold. Scale bar is 20 μm. (r) Recovery efficiencies of the ALPF for Au recovery in a low Ci range of 0.1-100 mg/L. (s) Adsorption isotherm test result of the ALPF adsorbent. The experimentally obtained data were fitted by three representative isotherm equations of Langmuir, Freundlich, and Sips models. (t) Comparison of qm and optimum pH value for the ALPF adsorbent with those of the adsorbents best reported in the literature, classified by the adsorbent size (nano, micro, and milliscale) or shape (particle and fiber). Credit: Korea Institute of Science and Technology

Enhanced Gold Recovery Techniques

KIST researchers have chemically immobilized alkaline molecules on the surface of polyacrylonitrile (PANF) fibers to improve both molecular gold recovery performance and structural stability. The amine-containing polymer fiber has a dramatically larger surface area, which can improve the adsorption performance of gold ions (Au) in waste by up to 2.5 times (from 576 mg/g to 1,462 mg/g) compared to the team’s previously developed granular gold adsorption material.

The developed fibrous adsorbent not only showed a gold recovery efficiency of more than 99.9% in solutions obtained by leaching real CPUs, but also achieved a gold recovery efficiency close to 100% in a wide range of pH 1-4, which includes most waste liquids. It is particularly noteworthy that only gold ions can be recovered with a high purity of over 99.9%, even in the presence of 14 other metal ions coexisting in the solution. Furthermore, the gold recovery rate was maintained at 91% even after 10 uses, demonstrating excellent reusability.

Extracting High-Purity Gold Figure 3

Figure 3. Applicability of the ALPF adsorbent for Au recovery processes. (a) Adsorption selectivity of the ALPF for Au(III) in the presence of coexisting metal ions including Cu(II), Pb(II), Cd(II), Mn(II), Ni(II), Co(II), Fe(II), Al(III), Cr(III), Zn(II), Na(I), K(I), Mg(II), and Ca(II). Ci of Au(III) was set to 10 mg/L, and those of other metal ions were set to 10, 100, and 1000 mg/L. Solution pH was adjusted to 1. (b) Purity of the recovered Au(0) by the ALPF. Inset shows an optical microscope image of the recovered Au(0). (c) Repetitive adsorption/desorption test of Au(III) using the ALPF adsorbent. Ci of Au(III) was set to 10 mg/L. Adsorption process was conducted for 24 h. Solution pH was adjusted to 1. Desorption process was conducted for 24 h using 0.5 acidic thiourea solution in 1.0 M HCl. (d) Deconvoluted HRXPS spectra of the ALPF for N 1s, showing the chemical change for amine groups of the ALPF adsorbent during the repetitive adsorption-desorption cycles. (e) Photograph of felts consisting of PANF (top) and ALPF (bottom), indicating that the fibrous adsorbent can be transformed into a desired shape. Scale bar is 2 cm. (f) Effect of the adsorbent shapes on the pressure drop in a column filled with the adsorbents. Each pressure drop in the column filled with the adsorbents was measured according to the volumetric flow rate. Credit: Korea Institute of Science and Technology

Conclusion and Future Prospects

“By enabling efficient and eco-friendly metal resource recovery, the fiber-type adsorbent developed by KIST can reduce Korea’s dependence on resource imports and prepare for the risk of rising raw material prices,” said Dr. Jae-Woo Choi. “We plan to expand the scope of future research to selectively recover various target metals in addition to gold, said Dr. Youngkyun Jung.”

Reference: “Efficient and selective gold recovery using amine-laden polymeric fibers synthesized by a steric hindrance strategy” by Youngkyun Jung, Su-Jin Yoon, Kyung-Won Jung and Jae-Woo Choi, 12 February 2024, Chemical Engineering Journal.
DOI: 10.1016/j.cej.2024.149602

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Group Says New Jersey Toxic Waste Dumping Caused $1B in Harm, Calls Settlement Inadequate

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The last few weeks of the year are always a special time — for shopping.  According to the National Retail Federation, a United States trade group, Americans will spend nearly $1 trillion on clothes, electronics, trinkets, and other goods during the 2024 holiday season, which it defines as November 1 through December 31. That’s about a fifth of the whole year’s retail sales in just two months. Will all that shopping make people happier? Probably not — more than half of Americans say they regret their previous Black Friday purchases, according to one national survey. Polling suggests the high people get from buying stuff is ephemeral; it fades quickly, only fueling the desire to buy more. Perhaps the biggest loser in the cycle of overconsumption, however, is the planet. 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In wonkier terms, the idea manifests as “extended producer responsibility,” or EPR, policies that typically require large companies to pay into a central fund for waste management and prevention. In the U.S., five states have passed EPR laws for packaging. Through interviews with former executives at Adidas, Amazon, and Apple, Buy Now! argues that consumer goods companies have knowingly abdicated their responsibility to the public good. Grist sat down with Bagenal to discuss the film and how she and her team of executive producers went about conveying the polluter pays principle to a general audience. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Courtesy of Netflix Q. What was your motivation for producing a film about overconsumption, and the role of big consumer goods companies in turning it into a crisis? A. We knew the waste problem was a really big problem, but we were worried about making something depressing that people turn away from. And so gradually, we evolved our thinking into shifting away from piles of rubbish and landfills and things like that — instead, we thought: Well, where’s it all coming from? And as you start peeling back the layers and going another step back, you realize that any film about waste is really going to have to be about who’s making the stuff that becomes waste. That was really a revelation for us — we realized that we could tell the story a bit differently and target companies that hadn’t been held accountable. Q. The film’s subtitle is “The Shopping Conspiracy,” hinting at the strategies companies use to get people to buy more while still denying responsibility for the resulting trash. But one could argue that this is exactly what we’d expect from companies incentivized to maximize their profits. Why do you think their behavior warrants being called out as a conspiracy? A. We had a lot of conversations about this — in the back of the taxi, in the back of the studio, in the edit suite. There’s no table where these imaginary execs sat around and decided to do this and then laid it on the world. But the conspiracy comes from the fact that you can’t work for one of these companies and not know the truth: that, while we’re all here trying to do our best, feeling guilty and wondering what we can do, these big companies are well aware of the impact they have on the planet and are still not doing enough. If I go down to the shop and decide to not buy a pot of yogurt because it might not be recyclable, nothing will change. But if a company like Adidas or Amazon or Apple actually decided to sell less stuff or make a product that would last three times as long, then something would change. Q. The philosophy you’re describing — that polluters should pay for their pollution — has been popularized among policy wonks as “extended producer responsibility.” What strategies did you use to make that idea more accessible? A. EPR is really popular in NGO [nongovernmental organization] and business circles, but we felt it was going to be really hard to communicate in a film and to get people to care. So we spent a lot of time trying to crystallize it into something that feels so obvious, that is hard to fight against. And actually, it was Erik Liedtke, the former Adidas exec, who hit the nail on the head at the end of the film. He said, “Stop putting it on us [the public], stop telling us it’s our responsibility. You produce this stuff, you need to account for its life after it gets thrown away.”  We also called the film “Buy Now!” to get at that moment when you press the button and you decide to give your money to a company. That transaction is the bit that makes money, that’s the bit that the industry is interested in. But once you press “buy now,” you’re making a contract that you don’t know about — you’re now a caretaker of this thing, and it’s your responsibility until you dispose of it, and then it becomes the whole world’s responsibility. The only one who’s not really responsible anymore is the company. Shoppers line up at a store with loaded carts. Courtesy of Netflix Q. Several countries and U.S. states have passed EPR laws, and environmental groups have put forward some ambitious proposals for new ones. But what’s the bigger-picture solution that those policies should be paired with? A. There is a lot of good stuff now that companies are doing. The fashion industry in particular has embraced the idea of EPR, and some of the consumer goods companies like Coca-Cola have talked about it. I think it’s really, really important as a tool for governments to hold companies to account and to share the costs of environmental impacts. But it doesn’t solve the problem entirely. I think all of us still need to buy less stuff, and companies need to make less stuff. It’s fine to tax [companies] for the end-of-life stuff, but it doesn’t get away from the fact that reduction is the ultimate goal. Q. Despite everything you describe about corporate responsibility for climate and environmental pollution, it can still be hard for people to imagine how to resist beyond individual actions — like by shopping less. How do you hope viewers will take action? A. Well, not shopping doesn’t have to be just forgoing something. It feels quite satisfying as an act of resistance to be like, “You know what? I’m not going to spend my precious time and money on this company. I don’t need another coat.”  But the people that I really think about are the people who are working inside companies and have been feeling guilty for a long time. The people who feel like there’s something wrong and they’ve tried to change it and no one’s listened, or that they’re not in the right job and they could be using their time and the energy to do something that is more constructive. It’s those people I would love to watch this and have a change of heart. We’ve already seen some reactions to the trailer from people who work in advertising who basically have said, “You know, we sell this shit to you, that’s what we do all day long. And we all feel really bad about it.” I would love it if there were a few people who saw this and took it as an opportunity to say, “You know what? I can do better than this.” This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Who’s responsible for waste? A Q&A about the ‘conspiracy’ of overconsumption. on Nov 27, 2024.

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Business
Crisis

As Fast Fashion's Waste Pollutes Africa's Environment, Designers in Ghana Are Finding a Solution

In a sprawling secondhand clothing market in Ghana’s capital, early morning shoppers jostle as they search through piles of garments, eager to pluck a bargain or a designer find from the stalls selling used apparel from the West

ACCRA, Ghana (AP) — In a sprawling secondhand clothing market in Ghana’s capital, early morning shoppers jostle as they search through piles of garments, eager to pluck a bargain or a designer find from the stalls selling used and low-quality apparel imported from the West. At the other end of the street, an upcycled fashion and thrifting festival unfolds with glamour and glitz. Models parade along a makeshift runway in outfits that designers created out of discarded materials from the Kantamanto market, ranging from floral blouses and denim jeans to leather bags, caps and socks.The festival is called Obroni Wawu October, using a phrase that in the local Akan language means “dead white man’s clothes.” Organizers see the event as a small way to disrupt a destructive cycle that has made Western overconsumption into an environmental problem in Africa, where some of the worn-out clothes end up in waterways and garbage dumps. “Instead of allowing (textile waste) to choke our gutters or beaches or landfills, I decided to use it to create something ... for us to use again,” said Richard Asante Palmer, one of the designers at the annual festival organized by the Or Foundation, a nonprofit that works at the intersection of environmental justice and fashion development.Ghana is one of Africa's leading importers of used clothing. It also ships some of what it gets from the United Kingdom, Canada, China and elsewhere to other West African nations, the United States and the U.K., according to the Ghana Used Clothing Dealers Association. Some of the imported clothes arrive in such poor shape, however, that vendors dispose of them to make room for the next shipments. On average, 40% of the millions of garments exported weekly to Ghana end up as waste, according to Neesha-Ann Longdon, the business manager for the Or Foundation’s executive director. The clothing dealers association, in a report published earlier this year on the socioeconomic and environmental impact of the nation’s secondhand clothing trade, cited a much lower estimate, saying only 5% of the items that reach Ghana in bulk are thrown out because they cannot be sold or reused. In many African countries, citizens typically buy preowned clothes — as well as used cars, phones and other necessities — because they cost less than new ones. Secondhand shopping also gives them a chance to score designer goods that most people in the region can only dream of.But neither Ghana's fast-growing population of 34 million people nor its overtaxed infrastructure is equipped to absorb the amount of cast-off attire entering the country. Mounds of textile waste litter beaches across the capital, Accra, and the lagoon which serves as the main outlet through which the city’s major drainage channels empty into the Gulf of Guinea.“Fast fashion has taken over as the dominant mode of production, which is characterized here as higher volumes of lower-quality goods,” Longdon said.Jonathan Abbey, a fisherman in the area, said his nets often capture textile waste from the sea. Unsold used clothes “aren’t even burned but are thrown into the Korle Lagoon, which then goes into the sea,” Abbey said.The ease of online shopping has sped up this waste cycle, according to Andrew Brooks, a King’s College London researcher and the author of “Clothing Poverty: The Hidden World of Fast Fashion and Second-hand Clothes.” In countries like the U.K., unwanted purchases often end up as charity donations, but clothes are sometimes stolen from street donation bins and exported to places where the consumer demand is perceived to be higher, Brooks said. Authorities rarely investigate such theft because the clothes are "seen as low-value items,” he said.Donors, meanwhile, think their castoffs are “going to be recycled rather than reused, or given away rather than sold, or sold in the U.K. rather than exported overseas,” Brooks said.The volume of secondhand clothing sent to Africa has led to complaints of the continent being used as a dumping ground. In 2018, Rwanda raised tariffs on such imports in defiance of U.S. pressure, citing concerns the West's refuse undermined efforts to strengthen the domestic textile industry. Last year, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni said he would ban imports of clothing “from dead people.”Trade restrictions might not go far in either reducing textile pollution or encouraging clothing production in Africa, where profits are low and incentives for designers are few, experts say.In the absence of adequate measures to stop the pollution, organizations like the Or Foundation are trying to make a difference by rallying young people and fashion creators to find a good use for scrapped materials.Ghana's beaches had hardly any discarded clothes on them before the country's waste management problems worsened in recent years, foundation co-founder Allison Bartella said. “Fast forward to today, 2024, there are mountains of textile waste on the beaches,” she said.Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Photos You Should See - Sept. 2024

Waste
Business
Pollution

What Bird Flu in Wastewater Means for California and Beyond

Wastewater in several Californian cities, including San Francisco and Los Angeles, recently tested positive for bird flu. But understanding disease risk and exposure to humans isn’t so straightforward

Since the first avian influenza outbreaks hit the U.S. early this year, health and agriculture experts have struggled to track the virus’s spotty path as it spreads in dairy cow herds and an unknown number of humans. Infection risk still seems low for most people, but dairy workers and others directly exposed to cows have been getting sick. Canada’s first human case was just reported, in a teenager who is in critical condition. To get a better handle on the unsettling situation, scientists are picking up a pathogen-hunting tool that’s been powerful in the past: wastewater surveillance.In the past couple of weeks, wastewater samples in several locations mostly scattered around California—including the cities of Los Angeles, San Francisco, Sacramento and San Jose—tested positive for genetic material from the bird flu virus, H5N1. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Wastewater Surveillance System reported detections at 14 sites in California during a collection period that ended on November 2. As of November 13, across the U.S., 15 sites monitored by WastewaterSCAN, a project run by Stanford University and Emory University researchers, reported positive samples this month. But finding H5N1 material in wastewater doesn’t necessarily mean there’s a risk to human health, says WastewaterSCAN’s co-director Alexandria Boehm, a civil and environmental engineer at Stanford University.Analyzing trace amounts of viral genetic material, often shed by fecal matter in sewers, can alert scientists and public health experts to a possible increase in community infections. Wastewater sampling became instrumental in forecasting COVID cases across the U.S., for instance. But the way H5N1 affects both animal and human populations complicates identifying sources and understanding disease risk. H5N1 can be deadly in poultry. Cattle usually recover from symptoms—such as fever, dehydration and reduced milk production—but veterinarians and farmers are reporting that cows have been dying at higher rates in California than in other affected states. Cats that drink raw milk from infected cows can develop deadly neurological symptoms. The current cases in humans haven’t caused any known deaths (most people have flulike symptoms, although some develop eye infections), but past major outbreaks outside of the U.S. have resulted in fatalities.On supporting science journalismIf you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.Scientific American spoke with Boehm about the latest bird flu detections in wastewater and the ways that scientists are using these data to better track and understand disease prevalence and exposure—among animals and humans both.[An edited transcript of the interview follows.]When did WastewaterSCAN start tracking H5N1?We noticed something very unusual in Amarillo, Tex. [In the spring of 2024,] after flu season, we saw really high levels of influenza A [one of the four flu virus types that infect humans] RNA nucleic acids in their wastewater. This was surprising because we know influenza A in wastewater tracks with cases in the community—but there were not very many cases in the community, and it was after flu season. We also then heard on the news that they had discovered cattle infected with avian influenza in the same area in Texas. So we worked in collaboration with the local wastewater treatment plants and public health officers to test the wastewater. And we found that, indeed, it was H5 [a subtype of avian influenza A virus] in their waste stream. We determined that most of that H5 was coming from legal discharges into the sanitary sewer from milk processing plants.Then when we scaled the H5 assay across the country, we were finding it in locations where, shortly thereafter, cattle were being identified as being infected [with the virus]. In June the CDC actually sent memos to the states asking them to try to measure H5 in wastewater, recognizing that the measurements can help to understand the extent and duration of the outbreak in the U.S.Has wastewater analysis been able to trace cases to any sources?We can’t always rule out that it’s wild birds or poultry or humans, but overall the preponderance of evidence suggests most of the inputs are likely from cow milk. That cow milk is getting into consumer homes, where people are disposing of it down the drain. I’m sure you have poured out milk down your sink—I know I have. It’s also coming from permitted operations where people are making cheese or yogurt or ice cream, and they might be starting with a milk product that has the avian influenza nucleic acids in it.I want to stress that the milk in people’s homes that might have the avian influenza RNA is not infectious or a threat to human health. It’s just a marker that some milk got into the food chain that originally had the virus in it. It’s killed because milk products are pasteurized—and that’s, by the way, why drinking raw milk or eating raw cheeses right now is not really recommended. The RNA that makes up the genome of these viruses is extremely stable in wastewater. It’s even stable after pasteurization. So you pasteurize the raw milk, and the RNA is still present at about the same concentrations.Detecting it in the wastewater does not mean there’s a risk to human health. What it does mean is that there are still infected cattle that are around the vicinity, and work still needs to be done to identify those cattle and remove their products from the food chain, which is the goal of the officials that are in charge of that aspect of the outbreak.How might we be able to better determine where the viral genetic material is coming from and assess human infection rates?It is very difficult because genetically the virus is not different [between sources]. It’s not like we can say, “Oh, the one in humans is going to be like this, and so let’s look for that.” We’re working really closely with public health departments that are really proactive in sequencing positive influenza cases. If we do start seeing it in [more] people, we will likely know it because we’ll see differences in the wastewater.I don’t want to be alarmist because right now the risk of getting H5N1 is very minimal, and the symptoms are really mild. But I think one of the concerns is that the virus could mutate during this influenza season coming up. Somebody who’s infected with [seasonal influenza] could also get infected with H5N1, and then it could maybe create a new strain that could be more severe. We’re hoping that the wastewater data, along with all the other data that people and agencies are collecting, will together help figure out what’s going on and protect public health better.What are trends are you seeing in your surveillance right now?Most recently, California is just lighting up. A lot of the wastewater samples in California are coming back as positive, even in locations that are very urban—such as the Bay Area and in Los Angeles. The question is: Why? In some of these locations, there actually are small operations where people are making dairy products with milk. But another explanation, like I mentioned earlier, is just the wasting of milk products.How do H5N1 levels in wastewater correlate to infections in animals?We’re sort of seeing it as an early indicator, or concurrent indicator, of cattle in the vicinity being infected with avian influenza. The first detections were in Texas, and we saw a lot of detections in Michigan for a while, and now the hot spot is California. As scientists, we’re going to analyze all this in the future. But anecdotally, the H5 detections in wastewater are following along with when herds are identified, and then once it’s sort of under control, we stop seeing it.Public health officials are using the data to say, “Okay, we got a positive in this location. What are the different sources that could account for it? Have we tested all the cattle that are contributing milk products to industries in this sewer shed? Have we gotten rid of all the infected herds in our state, because now we’re not getting any positives in the wastewater?”How else are scientists and officials staying on top of cases and spread?The [U.S. Department of Agriculture] and different entities around the country are pursuing it from an animal health perspective and a food safety perspective. So there is testing of cattle herds and milk products. There’s also testing of poultry, and then there’s testing of workers that are in contact with infected herds and infected poultry. On the clinical side, there is a push to get influenza-positive samples sequenced to understand what kind of influenza it is, as sort of a safety net to see if there might be some avian influenza circulating in people. So far, cases have been in people who are actually exposed to infected animals, who are working on farms, and perhaps in some of their family members.How has tracking H5N1 been different from or similar to COVID or other pathogens?All the other pathogens that we track have been conceptually similar to COVID, where humans are the source [of pathogenic material in wastewater]. We know that the occurrence of the viral or fungal material in wastewater match the cases. Bird flu is the first example where we’re using wastewater to track something that is primarily not, at least right now, from a human source but has potential human health implications for different reasons. It’s been a really great case study of how wastewater can be used not only for tracking human illness but also zoonotic pathogens—pathogens that affect animals. So now we’re thinking about what else wastewater could be used for. What other kinds of animal byproducts end up in the waste stream that might contain biomarkers of infectious disease? H5 is our first example, and I’m sure there will be more.

Waste
Water
Animals

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El País de la Eterna Primavera (Land of the Eternal Spring)

San Francisco-based photojournalist Jason Henry (New York Times, Vice, Wall Street Journal) treks to Guatemala’s most infamous landfill, Teculután. Against the backdrop of the Sierra de las Minas mountains, Henry tries to maintain his composure as he shoots children digging through the garbage in search of shreds of sustenance in a monstrous heap of human and animal waste and burning ash. Surrounded by swarming flies and accompanied by writer Erik Maza (Baltimore Sun, Town & Country), Henry observes, “This is their playground.”

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From Trash To Treasure: Turning Negatives into Positives in Lesotho

From erosion to overgrazing to enduring poverty, the people of Lesotho—a highland country surrounded by South Africa—face a variety of difficult challenges. Yet grassroots communities in the country also exhibit tremendous resourcefulness and creativity. In particular, a wealth of artists have mastered a talent for resurrection, developing the skill to creatively turn negatives into positives: Designers who turn discarded trash into beautiful jewelry, clothes, rugs. Filmmakers who turn tragedy into artistic expressions of resilience and compassion. Musicians who write songs to save the environment. In this short, Cultures of Resistance Films profiles a variety of these inventive creators, introducing viewers to a fascinating cast of local residents who are using art as a means of communicating a communal desire for positive change.

Culture
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Solutions

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