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Innovative Reactors for Recovery of Rare Earth Elements (REEs)

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Rare Metal Technology 2021

Part of the book series: The Minerals, Metals & Materials Series ((MMMS))

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Abstract

Interest in the recovery of Rare Earth Elements (REEs) has increased significantly in the last few years. There has been a concomitant increase in research and in process development for REE recovery [1]. Antisolvent crystallization has the potential to recover REE from solution at high yields and with minimal waste. However, antisolvent addition generally results in uncontrolled primary nucleation and very small product crystals. A better approach could be to carry out the crystallization in fluidized bed reactors. Therefore, our approach in this work was to focus on the development of a novel process for the recovery of REE by combining antisolvent crystallization and a fluidised bed process. Thermodynamic modelling showed that, when ethanol is added to a Nd2(SO4)3 or Dy2(SO4)3 solution as an antisolvent, the only solid products formed were the REE sulphate salts. Since the solubilities of the REE sulphate salts at any of the Organic/Aqueous (O/A) ratios are of similar orders of magnitude to those of salts that have been successfully recovered in a fluidised reactor process, an antisolvent, fluidised reactor process is potentially suitable for REE sulphate salts. Batch experiments showed that the yields are sufficiently high for a viable process. At the same time, the micrographs show that the nature of the formed crystals are such that they are likely to form uniform and robust coatings on seed particles in and fluidised bed reactor process. Therefore, our preliminary conclusion is that this REE system is well suited for further investigation in a combined antisolvent crystallization and fluidised bed process.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Crystallization and Precipitation Research Unit, Chemical Engineering Department, University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa

    Alison Lewis, Jemitias Chivavava, Jacolien du Plessis, Dane Smith & Jody-Lee Smith

Authors
  1. Alison Lewis
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  2. Jemitias Chivavava
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  3. Jacolien du Plessis
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  4. Dane Smith
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  5. Jody-Lee Smith
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Alison Lewis .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada

    Gisele Azimi

  2. The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan

    Takanari Ouchi

  3. KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden

    Kerstin Forsberg

  4. Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA

    Hojong Kim

  5. University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, SK, Canada

    Shafiq Alam

  6. University of Ilorin, Ilorin, Nigeria

    Alafara Abdullahi Baba

  7. IND LLC, South Jordan, UT, USA

    Neale R. Neelameggham

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© 2021 The Minerals, Metals & Minerals Society

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Lewis, A., Chivavava, J., du Plessis, J., Smith, D., Smith, JL. (2021). Innovative Reactors for Recovery of Rare Earth Elements (REEs). In: Azimi, G., et al. Rare Metal Technology 2021. The Minerals, Metals & Materials Series. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-65489-4_14

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