Recovery of Precious Metals from Catalytic Converters of Automobiles by Hydrometallurgical Solid-Liquid Extraction Processes

Today, among the basic requirements to be fulfilled by an automobile, those relating to environmental protection and recyclability are of great importance. This paper aims to present a new technological solution to recover rare metals - Platinum, Palladium and Rhodium - from automotive used catalysts, based on hydrometallurgical method of solid-liquid extraction. Following the theoretical and experimental researches, were established the technological sequences which must be carried for recovering precious metals from used automotive catalysts, in the pilot phase. The proposed technology has been applied for a quantity of 10 kg of used automotive catalysts of ceramic monolithic type, at the end of the recovery process and selective separation, resulting the following recovery efficiencies: 95 % for Platinum, 95 % for Palladium and 92 % for Rhodium. Finally, there were highlighted the main advantages of hydrometallurgical processes: versatility, economicity, high efficiencies and relatively low costs.