New extractants for separation of platinium-group metals from chloride solutions and their application to recycling processes

In this paper some results on the application of four N,N’-tetrasubstituted malonamide derivatives for the extraction and separation of platinum-group metals (PGMs) are presented. The above mentioned extractants were specifically synthesized in order to evaluate their efficiency for the extraction of a specific metal, or group of metals, from aqueous chloride matrices. Different behaviours were obtained towards platinum(IV) and/or palladium(II) extraction, all the N,N’-tetrasubstituted malonamide derivatives allowing the mutual separation of the two metal ions, depending on the HCl concentration. Generally, extraction experiments were carried out involving initial aqueous phases containing 100 mg/L of each metal isolate, in varying 1M to 8M HCl concentration ranges, and 0.05M extractant in 1,2dichloroethane solutions. From the preliminary results obtained, one can conclude that HCl concentrations and the structure of the malonamide derivative play a crucial role on the efficiency shown for Pt(IV) and/or Pd(II) extraction. The efficiency of the stripping stage of the loaded organic phases is variable, depending on the N,N’-tetrasubstituted malonamide derivative, as well as on the metal ion involved; for Pt(IV), distilled water and 1M HCl were generally successful, whereas for Pd(II), thiourea in HCl gave better results. The overall data already achieved suggest that these extractants may be good candidates for further evaluation in PGMs separations from real solutions resulting from recycling processes. 4 International Conference on Engineering for Waste and Biomass Valorisation September 10-13, 2012 – Porto, Portugal