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B.C. water-treatment company BioteQ advances third project in China |
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Written by REM Staff
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Vancouver-based BioteQ Environmental Technologies Inc. has initiated a third water treatment project in joint venture with Jiangxi Copper Company (JCC). The project is located at the Dexing Mine in China, to recover nickel and cobalt using a novel modification of conventional ion-exchange technology developed by BioteQ. The new plant will be in addition to the existing ChemSulphide® plant that currently operates at the Dexing site to recover copper from mine wastewater.
The joint venture partners have agreed to advance the project evaluation with a design report that will draw data from a pilot plant that is currently in operation at the site. BioteQ commissioned the pilot plant in February 2010 and JCC is responsible for the pilot plant operation under BioteQ’s technical supervision. The pilot plant campaign and design report will take approximately three months to complete. The design report will more fully define the project scope and parameters, including details about water flow to be treated, expected recovery rates, terms of sale for the recovered cobalt and nickel and detailed capital and operating cost estimates. Preliminary estimates indicate that the project will require about $2 million in capital, to be shared equally by the joint venture partners. The design report will analyze and refine these estimates.
When the design report is complete, the joint venture partners will review the project economics and determine whether to proceed to construction in the third quarter of 2010.
Prior to piloting at Dexing, BioteQ extensively tested the use of ion exchange technologies combined with BioteQ’s ChemSulphide and BioSulphide processes for cobalt and nickel removal at the company’s research laboratory and existing operations. By removing cobalt and nickel from the acid water at Dexing, the process further enhances the environmental benefits of BioteQ’s water treatment technologies and promotes sustainability by recovering valuable metals for recycle back to the metals industry.
This project builds on BioteQ’s joint venture with Jiangxi Copper Company, China’s largest copper producer. The companies signed a joint venture agreement in 2006 that identified six potential projects that could apply BioteQ’s water treatment technologies. In 2008, BioteQ commissioned the first plant at the Dexing Mine in China; that year, the site was awarded the China Mining Environmental Protection Award. An addition to the Dexing projects, the joint venture partners have completed a design report for a water treatment plant at the Yinshan mine, which is pending permits for mine expansion.
BioteQ is a water treatment company that applies innovative technologies and operating expertise to solve challenging water treatment problems, reducing environmental liabilities while delivering lower life cycle costs for water treatment. It has built 9 plants at sites in Canada, the US, China, Australia and Mexico, with additional projects in design and construction.
www.bioteq.ca
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