Enhanced By-product Recovery through the IOnometallurgy of primary sources

Ores and concentrates often contain enrichments of scarce or critical elements such as Te, Bi and Sb, but there are few financial incentives or competitive technologies that allow their recovery. They may be lost to tailings or roasted off (becoming an environmental liability), or can incur smelter penalties. Even when recovered during smelting and refining, the value may not be returned to the producer. Recovery of these elements, along with the main commodity (Au, Cu, etc.) would add value for producers and secure supply of elements that are key to European infrastructure, industry, and innovation. U.Leicester has demonstrated the potential of Deep Eutectic Solvent (DES) ionic liquids in the rapid and mineral-specific selective dissolution of gold and sulphide minerals and the subsequent recovery of major metals and by-products from solution. DESs (unlike many ionic liquids) are environmentally benign, chemically stable and the components are already produced in bulk at low cost, potentially making an industrial process feasible. This commitment is to develop this application, optimising by-product recovery so as to achieve a resourceand cost-efficient alternative to current practices. BRIO consortium has estimated that mineral ores amenable to BRIO currently encompass 90% of Cu, Ni, PGE, Pb, Zn, Sn, W worldwide production, which implies that the BRIO potential market for adopting by-product recovery from current identified reserves is up to 240.713 M€/year (current value of products detailed above). Expected results: -Evaluation of potential by-products in primary sources through geological database analysis and sample characterization -Production of a workflow/toolkit for industrial companies to better assess by-product availability in future resource assessments -BRIO process development, optimisation, scale-up to TRL5 (prototype in mining company partner of the consortium) and replication to other partner companies -Sustainability assessment of BRIO