After 6 months of the beginning of the CROCODILE project, the complete consortium met in Mons (Belgium) in order to update the achievements within this period.

During the first day, work packages related to the study of the physical treatment of primary and secondary cobalt-rich sources presented their main results. Work related to dissemination, communication and clustering activities was also presented during this first session of the day as well as the work to be done in the forthcoming months. After a networking lunch, the first governing meeting was held among a representative of each partner involved in the project. Finally, all the consortium had together a formal dinner in a relaxing environment that helped to assimilate the main conclusions reached during the discussions.

The second day was focused on the proposed chemical treatment presenting main laboratory results that helped to develop the first estimation of CAPEX and margin profit of the CROCODILE mobile plant. This activity was developed by Idener and set up the foundations of the design and basic engineering integrating the work carried out in all technical work packages. Finally, during the last session, updates on the state of the HydroWEEE plant, that is the one that will be used as a base for the integration of the CROCODILE technology, was presented.

The meeting finished with a visit to the COMET facilities. COMET Traitments is involved in the characterization and quantification of prospects containing cobalt in materials available in Belgium, which is a core activity within the work package related to the physical treatment. The main aim of the visit was to better understand the processing and recycling of shredder residues which is the by-product of the shredding of metallic wastes.