Optimisation of a pertraction process for wastewater treatment and copper recovery

The optimal operating conditions of a pertraction process for the recovery of Copper used as catalysts in a Wet Peroxide Oxidation (WPO) effluent is presented. Separation targets related to the maximum Copper concentration in the effluent for final disposal and minimum Copper concentration of the product are posed as inequality constraints of the optimization problem. A rigorous modeling of the pertraction process is used represented by a set of algebraic and differential equations which are posed as equality constraints in the optimization problem formulated in gPROMS and solved by gOPT. A reduction of 41 % in the batch time is achieved, indicating the room for improvement available in this cleaner and new technology. Variations of the batch time with respect to changes in the operating variables are reported.