Dominguez reported in 2018 that a literature review has been done on geothermal brines to identify relevant characteristics and compounds of interest (i.e., metals, rare-earth elements) that can be potentially recovered using the GDEx technology and are likely to form functional materials with potential commercial interest. On the other hand, as temperature can affect the performance of the system, and since the brine treated by the GDEx technology can be within 20-60°C (as defined by the CHPM proposal), this parameter was evaluated in the system, first using simulated brines.
The most important effects of temperature within this range concerned the formation of different products, variations on the system resistance, processing time, level of current, and process efficiency. The long term performance under these conditions was also assessed. Based on the relevant brine compositions obtained from the literature study, experiments with simulated Li-Al brines were conducted, as well as with real brines containing these metals (i.e., Romanian geothermal brines). The formation of mixed metal hydroxides was obtained, which have ample commercial relevance. Finally, the feasibility of employing microbial-electrochemical systems (i.e., bioanodes coupled to GDEx cathodes) was tested, proving that the GDEx system could be operated with lower or negligible power consumption, as well as it could even be used for the co-generation of electricity. Overall, the GDEx process is 2-3 fold more economical than classical mineral processing at the metal concentrations of geothermal brines and its up-scalability is feasible.
The author concluded that given the performance shown for the bioanodes coupled to the GD electrode in GDEx conditions, it is feasible to couple these components to achieve metal precipitation under the previously described conditions, at lower rates. Higher rates could be eventually achieved with better performing bioanodes.
Also see: "Co-production of clean energy and metals – the CHPM concept," by Éva Hartai1, Tamás Madarász1 and the CHPM2030 Project Team https://eurogeologists.eu/hartai-co-production-of-clean-energy-and-metals-the-chpm-concept/
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