Development of an innovative sustainable strategy for selective biorecover of critical raw materials from Primary and Secondary sources

Project Information

BIORECOVER

Grant agreement ID: 821096

DOI

10.3030/821096

Project closed

EC signature date 3 May 2019

Start date 1 June 2019

End date 29 February 2024

Funded under

• SOCIETAL CHALLENGES - Climate action, Environment, Resource Efficiency and Raw Materials

Total cost

€ 6 337 277,50

EU contribution

€ 6 337 277,50

Coordinated by

FUNDACION CENTRO TECNOLOGICO DE INVESTIGACION MULTISECTORIAL
Spain

Periodic Reporting for period 3 - BIORECOVER (Development of an innovative sustainable strategy for selective biorecover of critical raw materials from Primary and Secondary sources)

Reporting period: 2022-06-01 to 2024-02-29

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

The objective of BIORECOVER is the R&D of a new sustainable & safe process, essentially based on biotechnology, for selective extraction of a range of Critical Raw Materials, from relevant unexploited secondary & primary sources:
-Rare Earths (REE) from Bauxite Residue (BR)
-Magnesium from Mg wastes of low grade minerals and calcination by-products (MgW)
-Platinum Group Metals from flotation tailings & Platinum Group Minerals process residues
BIORECOVER will be based on the integration of 3 stages to reach the recovery rates (90%), selectivity (95%) & purity (99%) (TRL from 2-3 to 5):
(1) Remove major impurities in raw materials to achieve greater availability of target metals for their recovery.
(2) Mobilise these metals through specific and improved microorganisms to get a leachate enriched with the target CRMs.
(3) Development of a technology for recovering metals with high selectivity & purity that meet quality requirements for reuse.
Downstream processes will be studied for the reuse of recovered metals (brakes pads, oxygen sensors, powder Mg & catalysts). LCA & LCC and a Decision Making Framework will support these aims. A multidisciplinary consortium covering the whole value chain (from suppliers to end users) is involved, including 14 partners from 7 member states across EU (ES, DK, FR, LE, PT, SE & UK) and effective international cooperation with South Africa.
BIORECOVER concept aims to reduce the gap between the EU supply and demand for CRM providing a breakthrough flexible, versatile and modular alternative, based on three mainly bio-based steps. The scientific advances in the field of biotechnology will allow to exploit primary (MgW and Platinum low-grade ores - PLGO) and secondary raw materials (BR & PGM content byproducts -PCBP), inaccessible by conventional extraction methods.
Moreover, the transmission of the generated knowledge will be a key aspects of the BIORECOVER concept through effective actions such as conferences, seminars, workshops, publications in high impact journals, reports to feed the Raw Materials Information System (RMIS) . Finally, improvement of the awareness, trust and acceptance by relevant actors and general public on the importance of raw materials and its EU supply, will be crucial for project success, and will be addressed through an awareness campaign as part of dissemination and public perception studies towards novel BIORECOVER process.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8gl2Z59Xg8&pp=ygUKYmlvcmVjb3Zlcg%3D%3D

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

During this 3rd reporting period (RP), the partners from WP1 supplied raw materials for the integration of the process in WP5. Moreover, the final studies of the different previous stages were carried out, pre-treatment (WP2), treatment (WP3), and post-treatment (WP4). The best conditions for the mobilisation of the target metals were selected and integrated in WP5. Furthermore, the partners involved in WP6 were carried out the production of final products (real and simulated) with samples obtained in WP5.
Regarding the sustainability of the process, a complete analysis was carried out using the environmental, cost, and social life cycle analysis methodology (LCA, LCC, SLCA), complemented by an analysis of public perception through surveys and descriptive statistical analysis. Moreover, an analysis of the Health, Safety and Risk Assessment was also conducted using a Plan-Do-Check-Act methodology.
Complementary to all of this, a study of the valorisation of the residual streams for each process was carried out. Moreover, during this reporting period, several actions were developed to increase the impact of the BIORECOVER project through dissemination and communication strategies to the general public and target stakeholders, as well as to increase the uptake of project results by industry and the scientific community through the impact studies, exploitation and replicability tasks. Finally, meetings were held with the Stakeholder & Scientific Advisory Panel (SSAP) and their advices were taking into account.
Moreover, the end users, FAE, MAGNA and JM, have analysed the samples obtained from each integration process for their reuse in final products.
The mobilisation of REE from BR was successfully achieved with recoveries of 63% and 58% of Y and Sc, respectively, at bioreactor scale with a pulp density of 10%. Similarly, mobilisation of 94% of Mg from Mg calcination by-products was achieved at bioreactor scale with a pulp density of 2%. For PGMs, recovery of almost 78% of Pt and 58% of Pd present in PGMs was achieved at 10% pulp density at bioreactor scale, and more than 90% of Au was recovered from PGM flotation tailings. In addition, an efficient pre-treatment of PGM flotation tailings was carried out using indigenous thermophiles, achieving a removal of 99.3% for Co, 8.1% for Cr, 90.1% for Cu, 41.58% for Fe and 99.5% for Ni. In addition, the valorisation of the residual streams after the leaching process was demonstrated for the production of geopolymers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HAlNxJKbPzE

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

-BIORECOVER will have a high impact in innovative research fields on sustainable raw materials processing through the generation of cutting-edge knowledge. The know-how created generated 2 patents, 20 Scientific Publications in high impact journals, 1 Joint public-private publications, 40 participations in major events with 44 presentations, 22 blog articles and 6 Workshops and Seminars. Project completed 22 MsC and PhD thesis. Finally, the project organised a Final Event and a Winter School. Thus, the project consortium contributed to strengthen the EU raw materials knowledge base – feeding the relevant results into the RMIS .
-BIORECOVER flexible and modular approach has advanced in the CRMs extraction, covering five (LREE, HREE, Sc, Mg&PGM) of the 26 materials listed by UE, representing 19%, a very wide scope of elements.
-Through BIORECOVER – higher material-efficiency, low energy and water consumption, as well as “Zero Liquid Discharge”, and flexible & modular solution – the effectiveness of the process will increase, hence the economic impact, reducing capital expenditure, operational and maintenance costs. A reduction of 35% at economical level is expected to be achieved with respect to current processes
-A key impact in the long term arising from BIORECOVER will be the benefit for EU industry associated with Raw Materials, due to the high-performance of the integrated process for biomining proposed – processing, refining, equipment manufactures & CRM end-user industries will be directly impacted. BIORECOVER covers the whole value chain of Raw Materials Industry and can contribute to its competitiveness, enabling the achievement a high impact in terms of creating added value and new jobs.
-Risk, health and safety were studied during the project that also developed studies on sustainability of the new technologies that could guide the future scalation.
-The BIORECOVER solution supports the implementation of SDG12, Responsible Production and Consumption, contributes to the Strategic Implementation Plan of the EIP on Raw Materials and Circular Economy and improves public awareness, acceptance and trust in theraw materials sectors.

BIORECOVER Logotype