Abstract
The hydrometallurgical treatment of waste printed circuit boards for the recovery of precious metals generates acidic wastewater containing nitrate, chloride and residual base metals. The scope of this work is the study of a biological treatment process for the concurrent metal sequestering, nitrate reduction and wastewater neutralization. A pilot-scale packed-bed biofilm reactor was set up, inoculated with the strain H. denitrificans and experimentally monitored. The range of operating parameters examined included: (a) nitrate concentration 750–5750 mg/L NO3−; (b) pH 3–8; (c) Cu, Ni, Zn and Fe at 50 mg/L and 100 mg/L; and (d) chloride concentration 5%–10% as NaCl. The presence of metals did not affect denitrification at the concentrations examined. H. denitrificans completely reduced nitrate and the intermediately produced nitrite at elevated chloride levels. Denitrification shifted pH towards circumneutral to alkaline values, where iron, zinc, copper and nickel were sequestered quantitatively from solution via bioprecipitation. The proposed simple, robust and low-cost biological treatment unit is advantageous compared to the conventional wastewater treatment, where metal precipitation is based on chemical neutralization and the problem of nitrate removal remains unresolved.
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This research has been co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund of the European Union and Greek national funds through the Operational Program Competitiveness, Entrepreneurship and Innovation, under the call RESEARCH – CREATE – INNOVATE (project code: T1EDK-00219).
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Artin Hatzikioseyian, Pavlina Kousi and Emmanouella Remoundaki contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by Panagiota Mendrinou, Paschalis Oustadakis and Petros Tsakiridis. All authors contributed equally to the interpretation of the results and provided critical feedback. The first draft of the manuscript was written by Panagiota Mendrinou and revised by all authors who read and approved the final manuscript.
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Article highlights
• Denitrification is achieved at elevated metal, nitrate and chloride concentrations.
• Metal ions are sequestered via bioprecipitation.
• The effluent is neutralized.
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Mendrinou, P., Hatzikioseyian, A., Kousi, P. et al. Simultaneous Removal of Soluble Metal Species and Nitrate from Acidic and Saline Industrial Wastewater in a Pilot-Scale Biofilm Reactor. Environ. Process. 8, 1481–1499 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40710-021-00536-w
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40710-021-00536-w