With the green deal and the green transformation to renewable resources, electro mobility increases in demand. The motors are often made out of NdFeB magnets, which at the moment are mostly processed in China and less than 10 % of these rare earth magnets are produced in Europe. The European Union wants that at least 15 % of the strategic raw material should come from recycling . In the project SUSMAGPRO a consortium of 18 European partner came together to find a way to collect and sepa-rate magnets, recycle them and make new products out of them. Four different pilot plants are separating the magnets and using the HPMS (Hydrogen Processing of Magnetic Scrap) to prepare recycled NdFeB powder. This powder can be used in polymer bonded magnets, sintered or re-cast into new powder. It can be shaped via pressing, injection molding or extrusion and afterwards sintered. The products out of these processing routes can be fully dense anisotropic, anisotropic bonded, net shaped (PIM, PEM) or ingots.
For sorting and separating NdFeB magnets of TV speakers a sensing device and a conveying belt was constructed and tested. The HPMS was scaled up and with the addition of NdHx or with grain boundary diffusion, good magnetic properties could be achieved. One partner producing loudspeakers could not detect any significant differ-ences between new and recycled magnets. Other magnets are or will be tested in motors. Some challenges remain, as NdFeB powder reacts with oxygen and carbon, diminishing the magnetic properties and for using them, a coating has to be applied to protect them from harsh environments. The large variety of coatings which have the potential to contaminate the recycled material leads to the necessity to develop optimized separation treatments, using demagnetization, sandblasting, milling and sieving of the coating.