Concomitant Leaching and Electrochemical Extraction of Rare Earth Elements from Monazite.

Rare earth elements (REEs) have become increasingly important in modern day technologies. Unfortunately, their recycling is currently limited, and the conventional technologies for their extraction and purification are exceedingly energy and chemical intensive. New sustainable technologies for REE extraction from both primary and secondary resources would be extremely beneficial.

Biological Recovery of Platinum Complexes from Diluted Aqueous Streams by Axenic Cultures.

The widespread use of platinum in high-tech and catalytic applications has led to the production of diverse Pt loaded wastewaters. Effective recovery strategies are needed for the treatment of low concentrated waste streams to prevent pollution and to stimulate recovery of this precious resource. The biological recovery of five common environmental Pt-complexes was studied under acidic conditions; the chloro-complexes PtCl42- and PtCl62-, the amine-complex Pt(NH3)4Cl2 and the pharmaceutical complexes cisplatin and carboplatin.

Platinum recovery from industrial process streams by halophilic bacteria: Influence of salt species and platinum speciation.

The increased use and criticality of platinum asks for the development of effective low-cost strategies for metal recovery from process and waste streams. Although biotechnological processes can be applied for the valorization of diluted aqueous industrial streams, investigations considering real stream conditions (e.g.

Effect of oxidation and catalytic reduction of trace organic contaminants on their activated carbon adsorption.

The combination of ozonation and activated carbon (AC) adsorption is an established technology for removal of trace organic contaminants (TrOCs). In contrast to oxidation, reduction of TrOCs has recently gained attention as well, however less attention has gone to the combination of reduction with AC adsorption. In addition, no literature has compared the removal behavior of reduction vs.

Platinum Recovery from Synthetic Extreme Environments by Halophilic Bacteria.

Metal recycling based on urban mining needs to be established to tackle the increasing supply risk of critical metals such as platinum. Presently, efficient strategies are missing for the recovery of platinum from diluted industrial process streams, often characterized by extremely low pHs and high salt concentrations. In this research, halophilic mixed cultures were employed for the biological recovery of platinum (Pt).

Recovery of critical metals using biometallurgy.

The increased development of green low-carbon energy technologies that require platinum group metals (PGMs) and rare earth elements (REEs), together with the geopolitical challenges to sourcing these metals, has spawned major governmental and industrial efforts to rectify current supply insecurities. As a result of the increasing critical importance of PGMs and REEs, environmentally sustainable approaches to recover these metals from primary ores and secondary streams are needed. In this review, we define the sources and waste streams from which PGMs and REEs can potentially be sustainably recovered using microorganisms, and discuss the metal-microbe interactions most likely to form the basis of different environmentally friendly recovery processes.

Biotechnologies for critical raw material recovery from primary and secondary sources: R&D priorities and future perspectives.

Europe is confronted with an increasing supply risk of critical raw materials. These can be defined as materials of which the risks of supply shortage and their impacts on the economy are higher compared to most of other raw materials. Within the framework of the EU Innovation Partnership on raw materials Initiative, a list of 14 critical materials was defined, including some bulk metals, industrial minerals, the platinum group metals and rare earth elements.