Apple discovered a way to make millions of dollars with its old, broken iPhones.

According to its annual environmental report released this week, Apple recovered 2,204 pounds (more than a ton) of gold from recycled iPhones, iPads and Macs, which is $40 million worth.

Gold is highly averse to corrosion and an excellent conductor of electricity and is so used in the consumer electronics.

Actually Silver is the best conductor, but it is avoided, as it corrodes easily.  Copper is super-cheap, but it moves electrons too slowly for some of the most important computing tasks.

Apple specified that, 61 million out of the 90 million pounds of e-waste through recycling programs, was in reusable materials.

Relatively, gold is made of trivial amount, but as it is currently trading at more than $1,200 per troy ounce, it's among the most valuable materials, it pulled from all those old gadgets.

Not stopping with the gold, Apple (AAPL, Tech30) said, it also collected 23 million pounds of steel, 3 million pounds of copper, 12 million pounds of glass, 13 million pounds of plastic, 4.5 million pounds of aluminum, and 6,600 pounds of silver.

In the recent times, Apple has been ramping up its recycling programs, boosted by its Apple Renew program, that lets customers recycle any Apple device at an Apple Store.

Recently, Apple also started using a new experimental line of robots dubbed Liam. These robots are designed to disassemble 1.2 million phones a year, sorting all their various components. Liam prototypes are operating in California and the Netherlands.

Apple specifies that, it reuses several materials from the recycled phones and that reduces the need to mine those metals and materials from the earth.

By Phani Ch