The Cleansing Service Group (CSG) has developed a process to recover nickel of 99.9% purity from the complex waste generated mainly by the metal-plating industry. With the price of nickel expected to be around GBP 6700 per tonne this year, the Southampton-based waste management company believes that a new processing facility installed at its Cadishead site near Manchester is the first in the UK capable of recovering nickel from spent electroless-nickel solutions. Neil Richards, the CSG’s processing and disposal director, said: “Spent electroless-nickel solutions contain high levels of organics and salts and are notoriously difficult to recover by electrolysis alone. “The new method, which has taken nearly a year to develop in conjunction with metal-recovery specialist Kurion Technologies, successfully overcomes these problems. The plant, which was purpose-built at Cadishead to develop and prove the technology, puts the waste solution through a multi-stage pre-treatment chemical process before conventional electrolysis is employed to plate out the nickel. The company expects the facility to be in full production in the near future. The plant will be duplicated to increase production if demand makes this necessary or if it is decided to use the technology to recover other metals from waste such as copper
