Recycling military scrap metal is a complex process, but it will bring, in addition to ferrous, non-ferrous and precious metals.

Russian military scrap metal

The Armed Forces of Ukraine destroyed 5 000 units of Russian equipment in the seven weeks of the war, reports the railway magazine Railway Supply.

According to rough estimates by Forbes, Russian military scrap metal on Ukrainian land contains about 85 000 tons of metal.

about 75,000 tons – carbon and stainless steel;
2500 tons – aluminum;
a thousand tons – copper;
over 360 tons of titanium and magnesium;
10 kg of platinum, 18 kg of gold and 1.2 tons of silver.

The total cost of all this scrap metal is $45 million:

$31 million – ferrous scrap;
$8 million – copper;
$4 million – aluminum;
$1 million – other non-ferrous metals;
$1 million – precious metals.

Military scrap has its own specifics, says Alexander Sheiko, acting. Chairman of the Scientific and Expert Council of the Association “UAVtormet”. Disposal of military scrap metal, according to him, is a more complex and time-consuming process that requires state control. The metal itself should be sorted and completely cleaned.

The rest of the tank is sorted into types of metals that can be sold at open auctions or transferred to defense enterprises.

The tank consists of different types of metal, the proportion of which may differ depending on the model of the tank. Summarized it looks like this:

Alloy steel components. Such steel has a specific chemical composition that limits its use in the conventional metallurgical process. Before the war, such metal could be processed by one enterprise – Dneprospetsstal. In armored vehicles, the content of such a metal can reach 40%.

Components in carbon steel or cast iron. The content of such components on average does not exceed 30%, but their sorting is quite expensive and requires special skills.

Non-ferrous metal components. First of all, it is the engine and its parts, electrical wiring, various electronic systems. There are up to 15% of such metals in the tank.

To understand the scale: in 2021, the total procurement of scrap metal in Ukraine is 4.1 million tons. Ukrainian metallurgical plants used 80% of this scrap metal for steel production.

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