Recovery of copper, chromium and nickel from electroplating effluent by electrochemical technique

Abstract

The major purpose of this current work is to apply electrochemical techniques to recover heavy metals (such as copper, chromium and nickel) from electroplating effluent due to environmental and economic reasons. This work is divided into three sections. The first one is to recover copper from synthetic solution by using a classical reactor without membrane and by using a modified reactor, (Pulsed Porous Percolated Electrode, 3PE). The second section is to carry out a classical membrane reactor to recover chromium and nickel from a synthetic solution. The last one is to recover metals from a synthetic solution and a mixture of electroplating effluents. The results show that each metal has its own optimum recovery conditions. Then copper, chromium and nickel in the mixture can be recovered. The optimum current density to recover copper is 10 A/m2 whereas those of chromium and nickel are 90 A/m2. Chromium in hexavalent form (Cr6+) affects copper recovery, whereas trivalent chromium (Cr3+) does not.