ABSTRACT
This chapter aimed to selectively recover valuable metals from a real acidic leachate solution.
The solution originated from an earlier study where the metals were leached from crushed
discarded computer printed circuit boards (PCB) via biotechnological routes. The leachate
solution contained high concentrations of copper (Cu), iron (Fe), aluminum (Al), and minor
levels of zinc (Zn). The recovery efficiencies, process kinetics, the properties of the final
products were studied for two selected techniques, namely sulfidic precipitation and
electrowinning. In precipitation experiments with sulfide solutions, copper was selectively
precipitated at low pH, with a Cu:S molar ratio of 1:1, without requirement of any pretreatment.
83% and 95% of copper was precipitated at 35 mM and 100 mM of sulfide concentrations,
