An EC-funded multidisciplinary consortium has successfully developed a new approach for the removal and recovery of aqueous cadmium, at low concentrations, from industrial effluents and other metal contaminated wastewaters. Biosorption, elution and electrolysis processes generate clean water and high quality metal for recyclign and reuse. The electrochemical deposition of cadmium results in the production of metallic cadmium powder and a cadmium-depleted electrolyte for reuse as an eluant for cadmium-loaded biomass in the previous elution stage. This has been achieved using a Rotating Cathode Cell (RC Cell) which is a pilot-scale continuous flow cell, operatign at very high mass transport rates, recovering the metal automatically outside the cell. The development of the process entailed conditioning the electrolyte with buffering and complexing agents. Batch and steady-state controlled potentiostatic electrolysis were shown to be conducive to fine powder production with selective electrolytes.
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