Improving the rate of Cu+2 recovery from industrial wastewater using a vertical array of reciprocating perforated zinc discs

Abstract

This work investigates the possibility of improving the rate of Cu+2 recovery and/or removal from industrial wastewater by cementation technique using an array of pulsating horizontal perforated zinc discs. The results show that the rate of cementation was found to increase by increasing frequency and amplitude of oscillation (vibrating velocity); disc diameter; copper ion concentration and solution temperature while decreasing by increasing the disc separation. Under certain conditions using pulsating array of perforated zinc discs was found to increase the rate of mass transfer by a factor of 17 times the stagnant discs. The activation energy of the reaction was found to be 8.948 kcal/mol which indicates that under the present conditions cementation takes place under mixed control, i.e. the reaction is partially diffusion control. As such no overall mass transfer correlation could be obtained. Keywords: Cementation, Copper recovery, Reciprocation, Perforated disc, Wastewater