A circular solution to conserve strategic metals and resupply UK industry has marked important progress with the announcement by Bioscope Technologies of the successful commissioning of a secondary copper electrowinning plant at its bio-refinery in Cambridge. This is believed to be the first in the UK since the IMI James Bridge copper refinery facility closed in 1999.
The new system has been designed and built in conjunction with electrowinning technology leader emew Clean Technologies to take the leachate from Bioscope’s patented bio process and electroplate out 99.995% cathode grade copper from printed circuit boards (PCB). This uses cyclable systems to achieve minimum environmental impact compared to traditional copper electrowinning which uses an open tank electrolytic process. The Bioscope EMEW process is totally enclosed with no emissions generated requiring extraction.
“With copper making up around 25 – 40% of the metals found on a typical PCB we are well-positioned to address the surge in demand from industry for this critical mineral, accelerated by the increased focus on electric vehicles, renewable energy and data centre IT infrastructure,” said Jeff Borrman, CEO Bioscope Technologies. “Initially we will be producing around 200 metric tons (MT) of high-quality copper per year before rapidly scaling up to produce 10 times this amount.”
Added Borrman: “Our major investment in a state-of-the-art copper plant is part of our circular solution to reducing the high volume of critical PCB-based materials lost overseas, by recovering and refining them in a very sustainable way before resupplying to UK industry.”
Bioscope’s patented bacteria-based bioleaching and bio-refining refining technologies are focused on recovering a wide range of precious and strategic metals including not only gold but also silver, palladium and copper from PCBs, providing UK companies with a highly sustainable alternative to shipping PCB waste to refiners in Europe, Japan and USA.
“emew is proud to see the first commercial high-grade copper production from the plant after working closely with the Bioscope team over the last 2 and a half years said Kamlesh Melana, VP Sales at emew Clean Technologies. “We are excited to work with ground-breaking technology companies like Bioscope to address a part of the growing e-waste problem our planet is facing. Helping to close the circularity gap for copper, one of the most significant metals in the sustainability revolution, is really satisfying”.
