Last general meeting from ION4RAW project, corresponding to month 12, has coincided with some exceptional circumstances at global level, the COVID-19 pandemic. This fact prevented the partners from attending personally the update sessions to revise the active work packages. Thus, although it was not possible to visit Scotgold mines, the first provider of raw material for the main project goal of critical metal recovery, the project partners showed in their presentations, that in one way or another, they have adapted to the situation keeping active, and presenting interesting progresses in the project developments.
More in detail, the innovative process for mineral management proposed in the project, looks for maximum efficiency for element recovery as well as maximum global sustainability, and the advances reported in the mine material pre-treatment jointly with the first filtration and leaching tests with novel ionic liquids (DES – Deep Eutectic Solvents) specifically formulated, confirm a suitable progress.
Apart from the review of the ongoing technical activities, the second meeting day focused on an interactive Workshop among the partners, leaded by LGI, in order to establish some initial bases for the future exploitation of the project results.
