Environmental Technologies to Treat Rare Earth Element Pollution

Rare earth elements (REE) have applications in various modern technologies, e.g., semiconductors, mobile phones, magnets. They are categorized as critical raw materials due to their strategic importance in economies and high risks associated with their supply chain. Therefore, more sustainable practices for efficient extraction and recovery of REE from secondary sources are being developed. This book, Environmental Technologies to Treat Rare Earth Elements Pollution: Principles and Engineering: presents the fundamentals of the (bio)geochemical cycles of rare earth elements and which imbalances in these cycles result in pollution. overviews physical, chemical and biological technologies for successful treatment of water, air, soils and sediments contaminated with different rare earth elements. explores the recovery of value-added products from waste streams laden with rare earth elements, including nanoparticles and quantum dots. This book is suited for teaching and research purposes as well as professional reference for those working on rare earth elements. In addition, the information provided in this book is helpful to scientists, researchers and practitioners in related fields, such as those working on metal/metalloid microbe interaction and sustainable green approaches for resource recovery from wastes

Environmental Technologies to Treat Rare Earth Element Pollution

Rare earth elements (REE) have applications in various modern technologies, e.g., semiconductors, mobile phones, magnets. They are categorized as critical raw materials due to their strategic importance in economies and high risks associated with their supply chain. Therefore, more sustainable practices for efficient extraction and recovery of REE from secondary sources are being developed. This book, Environmental Technologies to Treat Rare Earth Elements Pollution: Principles and Engineering: presents the fundamentals of the (bio)geochemical cycles of rare earth elements and which imbalances in these cycles result in pollution. overviews physical, chemical and biological technologies for successful treatment of water, air, soils and sediments contaminated with different rare earth elements. explores the recovery of value-added products from waste streams laden with rare earth elements, including nanoparticles and quantum dots. This book is suited for teaching and research purposes as well as professional reference for those working on rare earth elements. In addition, the information provided in this book is helpful to scientists, researchers and practitioners in related fields, such as those working on metal/metalloid microbe interaction and sustainable green approaches for resource recovery from wastes

Research Advances for the Conservation of Cultural Heritage

Because European Cultural Heritage is an invaluable legacy, the Ministry for Science and Innovation funded the Spanish Network on Science and Technology for the Conservation of Cultural Heritage (TechnoHeritage), which began its activities in March 2011.Currently seventy five groups participate in the Network, including Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) and Spanish universities teams, cultural institutions, foundations and museums, and private companies. One of the activities of the Network is the organization of annual meetings. This International Congress—organised on behalf of TechnoHeritage by the Universidade de Santiago de Compostela— has a goal of creating an interdisciplinary forum for discussion on all aspects of cultural heritage conservation while providing an up-to-date and comprehensive picture of the state-of-the-art investigations in this field

Salt weathering in the coastal environment: the deterioration of wall paintings at Delos, Greece.

Salt weathering, apart from being an important geomorphologic agent, comprises a major hazard for both modern and heritage structures. Although its action is witnessed globally, it is particularly aggressive in coastal environments. The coastline attracted in antiquity a considerable part of human activity that has left valuable built traces. Conservation research is frequently called upon to define sustainability in this aggressive context. Wall paintings comprise an integral part of the built heritage. The particular importance of wall paintings and finishing layers derives from their unique aesthetic function in the building's integrity as well as the plethora of information that they carry. Whereas wall paintings are more susceptible than masonry materials, the tolerance against loss is much smaller due to their descriptive nature and scale. It is not until recently that international heritage organisations recognised the technical particularities of wall paintings suggesting that they must be investigated independently and treated in situ. This project aims to identify the particularities of wall paintings' susceptibility to salt weathering in the coastal environment. The methodology is composed of both in situ and ex situ experiments. The in situ investigation follows a comparative approach, guided by specific variables, in a number of monuments at the archaeological site of Delos island. The goal of the in situ investigation is to determine the optimal conditions for preservation, by modeling the salts interactions, in an effort to define sustainability against salt weathering in this aggressive environment. The ex situ approach comprises laboratory simulation of the weathering mechanism and aims to describe the particularities of the substrate that lead to the distinct loss of the external finishing layer, which carries the principal information. The results of the project underline the importance of kinetic deviations deriving from the solution and the substrate properties. Despite the limitations of determining the optimal conditions for preservation, the variables that directed the comparative approach permitted the generation of a periodic model in agreement with the phenomenological observations. The model suggests that the potential of salt damage in real conditions of various contamination pathways and sources cannot be restricted to a single resultant. Although the model follows a certain periodicity in response to the annual climatic cycle, random events and fractionated accumulation lead to the production of mixtures with variable composition. Additionally the results stress the role of solar radiation and air movement as evaporation accelerators. Consequently environmental control against salt weathering should be directed towards multiple components which in the case of coastal environments, mainly due to the presence of marine aerosols, cannot be achieved simply by hygrothermal management. On the other hand we traced specific deviations from the theoretical model of salts interactions, concerning mixtures commonly found in coastal regions that should also be taken into account. Besides we tested the hypothesis of salts accumulation at the interface of rendering layers, caused by hydraulic discontinuity, with a weathering simulation. The aim of this investigation was to provide evidence descriptive of damage. It has been shown that the external layer of wall paintings is particularly susceptible to marine aerosols and it can be damaged independently and in advance of the bulk mortar. The salts crystallise selectively under the lime wash layer causing gradually its detachment from the mortar. The results of the weathering simulation raise serious implications for remedial and preventive conservation practice and suggest that research must focus as well on the kinetics of particular cases

Resource, recycling and waste challenges for storage resources in a 100% renewable economy

In this thesis, the battery storage needed for a 100% renewable economy was calculated. It was determined that the use of batteries as a worldwide energy storage solution is not viable. Other systems, such as power-to-gas, would undoubtedly be a better match, as they are much less resource-intense, and they could be combined with the existing natural gas infrastructure for lowered costs. Data was gathered for two regions that would be studied in detail. These regions were (1) Germany, Austria and Luxemburg, and (2) California. An in-depth analysis of the load and renewable generation (from solar and wind) profiles was done, which was used to calculate the amount of battery storage that would be needed in the area, as well as the requirements that an electrolyzer should be able to meet. Data was also gathered for the world, which enabled a study about consumption, generation and current renewable capacity, among others. Solar irradiation and wind maps were used to estimate the potential of each of the renewable sources studied to provide energy in the scenario of a 100% renewable economy. A theoretical approach about electrolyzer technologies, batteries and practical aspects of hydrogen as a gas fuel can also be found in the thesis. The available data for the two regions studied, along with the results of their storage calculations, was used to calculate the fraction of energy that was provided by each of the renewable sources studied. With this information, an equation was obtained and used to calculate the storage needed for other regions in the world if their approximate renewable potential (fraction) and consumption were known. The estimated total energy storage for the world was then calculated considering each of the continents and was found to be a total of 19,981 TWh (100% roundtrip efficiency – ideal battery). Since the average energy density of batteries is known, it is estimated that this amount of storage would require a 133,205 Mt battery, and since the estimated composition of lithium-ion batteries is also known, it was calculated that to build such an amount of storage would be quite resource-intense: 3,143.64 Mt of lithium and 25,815.13 Mt of cobalt. If the reader takes into consideration that the lithium and cobalt reserves are estimated to be about 53 Mt and 145 Mt, respectively, it is easy to see that the calculated amounts required for the battery are, by far, too large to be executed. Due to the low cost of extracted lithium, the fraction of the metal used today that comes from recycling is scaringly close to zero. Most of the recycling processes for lithium are currently only at research stage, and the majority of them combine physical (battery dismantlement and crushing, along with physical separation of compounds) and chemical processes (leaching, extractions, precipitations), the latter being the ones that have traditionally been used in the mine industry to extract metals (hydrometallurgy). They use harsh chemicals that can be cleaned and reused, and finally sent to a dedicated treatment plant as it is done in the chemical industry. These results were obtained by means of gathering and analyzing data on energy consumption and generation profiles, and considering renewable capacities for solar and wind, in the case of the specific regions; considering information on global and continental-based energy consumption and generation amounts, and renewable potentials for the worldwide estimations; and studying the composition and characteristics of the lithium-ion batteries used today, along with the available critical metals reserves, to calculate the amounts of resources that would be needed to fabricate the calculated energy storage devices.Outgoin

Microbial weathering of shale rock in natural and historic industrial environments

The weathering of shales is a globally important process affecting both natural and built environments. Shales form roughly 70 % of worldwide sedimentary rock deposits and therefore the weathering of these rocks has substantial effects on the geochemical cycling of elements such as carbon, iron and sulfur. Microbes have been shown to play a key role in weathering shales, primarily through the oxidation of the iron and sulfur of embedded pyrite and the resultant production of sulfuric acid. Despite significant interest in the microbial weathering of shales within industrial sectors such as biohydrometallurgy and civil engineering, comparatively few studies have investigated microbial shale weathering in natural environments. Furthermore, the role of microbes in natural shale weathering processes beyond iron oxidation has largely remained unexplored. In this thesis, the weathering capabilities of microbial communities from natural weathered shale was investigated. The North Yorkshire coastline was used as a study location, due to the abundance and diversity of natural cliffs and historic, disused industrial sites. Cliff erosion and recession on the North Yorkshire coastline is a major concern for local authorities and is the focus of current research. The aim of this work has been to evaluate microbial shale weathering processes within these environments, and hypothesise the possible contribution they may have to erosive processes. Phenotypic plate assays inoculated with weathered shale material were used to obtain rock weathering bacterial isolates that tested positive for a specific weathering phenotype, such as iron oxidation or siderophore production. Subsequent 16S rRNA sequencing enabled genera level identification, revealing 15 genera with rock weathering capabilities with several being associated with multiple weathering phenotypes including Aeromonas sp., Pseudomonas sp. and Streptomyces sp.. Shale enrichment liquid cultures were incubated with shale rock chips to simulate natural biological weathering conditions, and the concentration of rock-leached elements in the fluid measured. No evidence of microbially-enhanced leaching was found consistently for any element, however the significant reduction in leachate iron concentration under biological conditions indicates that iron precipitation occurred via microbial iron oxidation. Enrichment cultures inoculated with weathered shale and containing organic matter (OM) rich rocks in water or M9 medium, both liquids lacking an organic carbon source, were grown over several months. The cultures yielded microbial isolates that could utilise rock bound OM sources and one bacterial isolate, Variovorax paradoxus, was taken forward for ecophysiological study. The shale rock that the organism was isolated from, along with other OM rich rocks (mudstones and coals), elicited complex responses from V. paradoxus including enhanced growth and motility. Finally, mineral microcosms in vitro and mesocosms in situ investigated microbial colonization and weathering of shale-comprising minerals (albite, calcite, muscovite, pyrite and quartz). Microcosms were established using iron oxidizing enrichment cultures, as based on the results of the simulated rock weathering experiments, while the in situ mesocosms were buried within weathered shale scree within a disused mine level. Levels of colonization significantly varied between minerals within the microcosms (pyrite>albite, muscovite>quartz>calcite). Although differences in mineral colonization were seen in the mesocosms, they did not match those in the microcosms and were not statistically significant. Pyrite incubated in the microcosms became significantly weathered, with extensive pit formation across the mineral surface that is consistent with microbial iron oxidation. In the mesocosms, pit formation was not identified on pyrite surfaces but dark etchings into the pyrite surface were found underneath fungi hyphal growth. The results of this thesis highlights that a range of microbial rock weathering mechanisms are abundant across weathered shale environments. Microbial iron oxidizing activity was a dominant biogeochemical process that altered rock-fluid geochemistry and weathered pyrite surfaces. However, the impact on rock or mineral weathering of other microbial mechanisms was not elucidated by this work. Given the known capabilities of these mechanisms, the conditions under which they are active may not have been met within the experimental setup used. Microbial iron oxidation in shale and shale-derived materials has previously been demonstrated to weaken rock structure through acid production and secondary mineral formation. From the results of this thesis, it is clear that microbial iron oxidation is an active process within some of the weathered shale environments studied, including cliff surfaces. Therefore, it can be hypothesised that microbial activity could play a role in structurally weakening shale rock within cliffs and accelerate their erosion. Future work should attempt to quantify the rate and extent of microbial iron oxidizing activity within shale cliff environments and investigate its contribution to erosive processes

Analytical tools applied to the evaluation of the influence of different marine environments on the conservation state of building materials

362 p.Marine aerosol is a chemical complex system formed by inorganic salts and organic matter, together with airborne particulate matter from the surrounding environment. The primary particles transported in the marine aerosol (PMA) can experiment different chemical reactions in the atmosphere, promoting the so-called Secondary Marine Aerosol (SMA) particles. These kinds of particles, together with the natural crustal or mineral particles and the metallic airborne particulate matter emitted by anthropogenic sources (road traffic, industry, etc.) can be deposited on building materials from a specific construction following dry deposition processes. Apart from that, the acid aerosols (e.g. CO2, SO2, NOX, etc.) present in modern urban-industrial environments, coming also from anthropogenic sources, could be deposited in the buildings following dry or a wet deposition mechanisms. The interactions of these natural and anthropogenic stressors with building materials can promote different kind of pathologies.In this PhD work, the negative influence of different marine environments (direct or diffuse influence), with or without the influence of an urban-industrial area (direct or diffuse), on the conservation state of two historical constructions and some newly built houses from the Basque Country (north of Spain) was evaluated. These constructions include a wide variety of building materials (sandstones, limestones, artificial stones, bricks, plasters, cementitious materials, etc.). The analytical methodology applied for this purpose involved, in some case studies, the use of non-invasive portable/hand-held spectroscopic technique (ED-XRF and Raman spectroscopy) able to perform an in situ screening in order to extract preliminary results. After that, non-invasive spectroscopic techniques (micro-Raman spectroscopy, FT-IR, XRD, -ED-XRF, SEM-EDS), together with destructive techniques (ICP-MS and ion chromatographic), thermodynamic modellings and chemometric tools was also applied to extract the final conclusions about the pathologies identified on the constructions under study in relation with the specific marine environment where they are located.Thanks to the use of these analytical tools, it was possible to characterize different deterioration processes caused mainly by the influence of marine aerosol (wet and dry deposition), infiltration waters, birds droppings, salts migrations, atmospheric acid gases impact, biological colonizations, etc. Moreover, the characterization of the PMA particles and SMA particles was conducted, thanks to the development of a home-made passive sampler in the last case. Additionally, the deposition of this kind of particles on sandstone, following dry deposition processes, was also confirmed

Analytical tools applied to the evaluation of the influence of different marine environments on the conservation state of building materials

362 p.Marine aerosol is a chemical complex system formed by inorganic salts and organic matter, together with airborne particulate matter from the surrounding environment. The primary particles transported in the marine aerosol (PMA) can experiment different chemical reactions in the atmosphere, promoting the so-called Secondary Marine Aerosol (SMA) particles. These kinds of particles, together with the natural crustal or mineral particles and the metallic airborne particulate matter emitted by anthropogenic sources (road traffic, industry, etc.) can be deposited on building materials from a specific construction following dry deposition processes. Apart from that, the acid aerosols (e.g. CO2, SO2, NOX, etc.) present in modern urban-industrial environments, coming also from anthropogenic sources, could be deposited in the buildings following dry or a wet deposition mechanisms. The interactions of these natural and anthropogenic stressors with building materials can promote different kind of pathologies.In this PhD work, the negative influence of different marine environments (direct or diffuse influence), with or without the influence of an urban-industrial area (direct or diffuse), on the conservation state of two historical constructions and some newly built houses from the Basque Country (north of Spain) was evaluated. These constructions include a wide variety of building materials (sandstones, limestones, artificial stones, bricks, plasters, cementitious materials, etc.). The analytical methodology applied for this purpose involved, in some case studies, the use of non-invasive portable/hand-held spectroscopic technique (ED-XRF and Raman spectroscopy) able to perform an in situ screening in order to extract preliminary results. After that, non-invasive spectroscopic techniques (micro-Raman spectroscopy, FT-IR, XRD, -ED-XRF, SEM-EDS), together with destructive techniques (ICP-MS and ion chromatographic), thermodynamic modellings and chemometric tools was also applied to extract the final conclusions about the pathologies identified on the constructions under study in relation with the specific marine environment where they are located.Thanks to the use of these analytical tools, it was possible to characterize different deterioration processes caused mainly by the influence of marine aerosol (wet and dry deposition), infiltration waters, birds droppings, salts migrations, atmospheric acid gases impact, biological colonizations, etc. Moreover, the characterization of the PMA particles and SMA particles was conducted, thanks to the development of a home-made passive sampler in the last case. Additionally, the deposition of this kind of particles on sandstone, following dry deposition processes, was also confirmed