Trash to treasure: From construction waste to tellurium adsorbent materials

Solid waste, such as construction waste, electric and electronic equipment wastes, has become one serious global challenge due to the presence of toxic substances and non-biodegradable substances in it. Recycling valuable resources from these solid wastes is essential for circular economy and sustainable development strategies due to the valuable elements and potential environmental risks of solid waste. Herein this work presents a promising method for fabrication of high-effective adsorption material using construction waste as raw materials, promising for coarse tellurium extraction from photovoltaic waste. At first stage, porous ceramic particles were obtained by ball milling, acid treatment, and calcination of brick powder. Then, the layered double hydroxides-activated brick mass (LDH-ABM) with high tellurium adsorption properties were fabricated by coating of ceramic particles with a layer of Al2O3 and subsequent hydrothermal growth of LDH nanosheets. The results indicated that the LDH-functionalized brick particles were assembled by LDH nanoplates, which was favorable for efficient tellurium ions transport into the internal part of adsorbents. The micro/nanoscale hierarchical structures of the LDH-ABM along with their porous nature and high specific surface also make them have excellent tellurium adsorption ability. In addition, the adsorption ability can be recovered by the economically sustainable regeneration process. The high tellurium adsorption capacity was attributed to the large surface of porous brick particles which provides more tellurium adsorption sites by reducing the nanoplates aggregation. The controlled process presented here provides an effective way to fabricate functional adsorbent using construction waste as raw material for potential application in tellurium extraction.