2015-Sustainable Industrial Processing Summit
SIPS 2015 Volume 4: Meech Intl. Symp. / Mining Operations
| Editors: | Kongoli F, Veiga MM, Anderson C |
| Publisher: | Flogen Star OUTREACH |
| Publication Year: | 2015 |
| Pages: | 275 pages |
| ISBN: | 978-1-987820-27-0 |
| ISSN: | 2291-1227 (Metals and Materials Processing in a Clean Environment Series) |
< CD shopping page
Green Technologies for Elemental Recovery and Sustainability
Andrew Hunt1; Helen Parker1; Liz Rylott1; Andrea Munoz Garcia1; Vitaliy Budarin1; Neil Bruce1; James Clark1;1UNIVERSITY OF YORK, York, United Kingdom (Great Britain);
Type of Paper: Regular
Id Paper: 513
Topic: 4
Abstract:
Over the last several years, there has been a growing awareness of the criticality of elements we utilize in chemical products and also consumer goods. The reserves of these elements are depleting at a rapid rate and are being quickly dispersed throughout our environment. Many of these important unique elements have low recycling rates and recapturing is both challenging and costly. As such, it is essential to develop new sustainable routes for the use and recovery of these elements. Herein, two such routes highlight the importance of adopting a sustainable, holistic and multi-disciplinary approach to the recovery of all elements.
Recently, it has been demonstrated that plants can accumulate metals in nanoparticulate forms through phytoextraction. We demonstrate the use of plants to recover metals and their transformation into supported metal nanoparticle based catalysts for use in a wide range of applications. The effective production of such materials by plants could open new doors in catalyst development and present solutions to critical element availability.
Polysaccharides including starch are non-toxic, biodegradable, possess polyfunctionality and are found in nearly every geographical location on the planet. The development of tunable, nano-structured and mesoporous carbon monoliths derived from waste polysaccharides will open new doors to adsorbents. The surface chemistry, functionality and surface polarity of these materials can be controlled through varying the temperature of preparation, thus making them ideally suited for the recovery of a wide variety of elements. These materials have been demonstrated to not only adsorb metals but also offer an effective method for separation and selective elemental recovery.
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to acknowledge the G8 Research Councils Initiative on Multilateral Research Funding and the EPSRC for their financial contribution.