Project NEMO: Near-zero-waste recycling of low-grade sulphidic mining waste for critical-metal, mineral and construction raw-material production in a circular economy.

With an estimated volume of 600 M tone/yr and a historic stockpile of 28.000 Mtone, sulphidic mining waste from the production of Cu, Pb, Zn and Ni, represents the largest volume of extractive waste in Europe. When poorly managed, these “tailings” may cause major environmental problems such as acid mine drainage.  In 2016 EIP Raw Materials launched a “call to arms” to transform the “extractive-waste problem” into a “resource-recovery opportunity”, as “tailings” still contain valuable & critical metals. 

Using a “4 PILOTS – 2 case-studies” concept NEMO develops, demonstrates and exploits, therefore, new ways to valorize sulphidic tailings. The 2 cases are the Sotkamo Ni-Cu-Zn-REE/Sc mine in Finland and the Las Cruces Cu-mine in Spain; the 4 PILOTS are located at key points in the near-zero-waste flowsheet, encompassing the recovery of valuable & critical metals, the safe concentration of hazardous elements, the removal of sulphur as sulphate salts, while using the residual mineral fraction in cement, concrete and construction products. NEMO has established an interdisciplinary consortium, including 8 industrial partners (2 mining, 4 engineering, 1 machine manufacturing & 1 construction material company), 4 research institutes, 2 universities and 1 civil society group. 

NEMO’s near-zero-waste technology aims to provide the EU with both direct and long-term, indirect advantages. The former range from new resources (e.g. base metals: Cu, Zn, Ni, Pb; critical metals: Sc, Nd, Y, Sb; SCM and aggregates etc.), CO₂ savings from metal recovery and the replacement of Ordinary Portland Cement), new job creation (> 150 FTEs), new revenues (> 200 M€/yr) while the latter represent the multiplication of the former benefits (cf. 28.000 Mtone of these tailings), while eradicating acid-mine drainage and other environmental issues, and ensuring an enhanced dialogue (framework) between industry and civil society, to obtain and maintain the License to Operate mines in EU.

Our main tasks

• Optimized engineering and construction of TRL7 reactor prototype at Las Cruces site.
• Optimized detailed engineering design and construction of alkaline leaching prototype
• Design, engineering & construction of pilots
• Engineering of integrated near-zero-waste pilot
• Development of robust process control
• Development of metallurgical toolbox

Partners

BOLIDEN | BRGM | CATAPA | DMT | FINNISH MINERALS GROUP | IDENER.AI | IMNR | JACOBS | KU LEUVEN | RESOURCEFULL | SKYSCAPE (SKYSC) | THYSSENKRUPP | UNIVERSITY OF EXETER | VITO | VTT

Start date – finish date

05 / 2018 - 10 / 2022