Summary
- Profile Type
- Technology offer
- POD Reference
- TOES20230914013
- Term of Validity
- 14 September 2023 - 13 September 2025
- Company's Country
- Spain
- Type of partnership
- Research and development cooperation agreement
- Targeted Countries
- All countries
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General information
- Short Summary
- A Spanish research centre has designed a treatment with low environmental impact technologies, of liquid and solid wastes, to extract and recover metals to be used as secondary raw materials, based on a circular economy concept. Partners for a research or technical collaboration are sought to bring closer the treatment to real environment and to start applying it in different wastes.
- Full Description
-
The treatment that the Spanish research centre has designed consists of the extraction and recovery of metals from liquid and solid wastes, especially the critical ones, such as Co, Cu, Zn, Li, Mn, Ni, Au and Pd, to be used as secondary raw materials.
Both, the waste to be processed and the metals to be recovered, will define the sequential treatment using different technologies. The whole treatment prioritizes low chemicals and energy consumptions as well as a circular economy approach. Electrochemical technologies are the core of the treatment.
Starting from liquid or crushed/shred/cut solid waste a complete sequence of the treatment would include one or several of the following steps: pre-treatment, leaching, separation and recovery. Metals are obtained as metallic, salts or oxides chemical state. Once recovered they could be used as secondary raw materials in many sectors. Electrochemical technology is used to leach metals or to recover them in metallic state.
Depending on the metal or group of metals the TRL of the treatment is between 4 and 5. For now, it has been tested with the following wastes: Li Batteries, electronic wastes, metallized plastic and metallic liquid waste from surface treatment sector.
The centre looks for partners to establish a research or technical agreement to increase the TRL of the treatment making it closer to an operational environment and to start applying it in other wastes. - Advantages and Innovations
-
The main advantages come from the use of electrochemical pathways as main treatment in the extraction or recovery of metals, specifically the following:
- Avoiding use of toxic chemicals
- Minimizing secondary wastes
- Avoiding extreme pHs or thermal swings
- Better selectivity to separate metals in multicomponent mixtures
Additionally, it is a versatile, modular, and scalable approach and can be easily combined with hydrometallurgical technology. - Technical Specification or Expertise Sought
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- Anode recovery in Lithium batteries
- Formulation of new cathodes for Lithium batteries using metals recovered coming from their recycling process.
- Optimization of Fe removal in liquids where it is mixed with other metals - Stage of Development
- Lab tested
- Sustainable Development Goals
- Goal 12: Responsible Consumption and Production
- Goal 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure
- IPR status
- No IPR applied
Partner Sought
- Expected Role of a Partner
- The centre looks for partners from the research or from the industrial sectors to establish a research or technical agreement to increase the TRL of the treatment making it closer to an operational environment and to start applying it in other wastes.
- Type and Size of Partner
- R&D Institution
- SME <=10
- SME 50 - 249
- SME 11-49
- University
- Type of partnership
- Research and development cooperation agreement
Dissemination
- Technology keywords
- 10004001 - Industrial Water Treatment
- 10003004 - Recycling, Recovery
- 02007010 - Metals and Alloys
- 10003007 - Waste to Energy /Resource
- Market keywords
- 08004004 - Other pollution and recycling related
- 09008002 - Water, sewerage, chemical and solid waste treatment plants
- 09004008 - Other manufacturing (not elsewhere classified)
- Sector Groups Involved
- Energy-Intensive Industries
- Targeted countries
- All countries
