A chemical engineering professor at Worcester Polytechnic Institute has received an $800,000 award from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to study the recovery of critical minerals like uranium from industrial wastewater—work spurred in part by a growing demand for nuclear fuel as the world’s capacity for nuclear power increases.
The International Atomic Energy Agency’s “high case scenario” estimates world nuclear power capacity will increase by 2.5 times the current level by 2050. Given the momentum of this global growth, researchers are working to identify unconventional sources of uranium, like highly toxic industrial wastewater from mining and milling operations. The efforts are intended not only to recover uranium for use, but also to minimize the amount of uranium in the environment.
“Being able to extract uranium from uranium-bearing mining wastewater will improve the health of ecosystems while addressing uranium security for the nation’s needs,” said Xiaowei Teng, the James H. Manning Professor of Chemical Engineering.
The current uranium separation process, called adsorption, is costly and has limited capacity. Teng will focus instead on understanding how heavy metal ions interact with electrode materials to design an electrochemical system capable of recovering uranium from wastewater. Ultimately, the methods Teng and his team will examine could result in a more efficient process that yields more uranium and produces less toxic wastewater.
“We want to move away from reliance on trial-and-error methods and instead figure out the key features that help us extract uranium from wastewater more effectively and efficiently,” Teng said. “Part of this study will be to develop new materials for electrodes that can be used repeatedly and are designed to recover important elements in an environmentally responsible way.”
Teng’s work on the grant will build on his previous research using chloride ions from seawater to develop green batteries and separating urea from wastewater.
The three-year grant is administered by the Separation Program at the Office of Basic Energy Sciences at DOE. Teng is the principal investigator on the grant and will work with subaward principal investigator Özgür Çapraz, an associate professor in the Department of Chemical, Biochemical, and Environmental Engineering at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.
