s Separation of Heavy Rare Earth Elements with Extraction Chromatography

Used mainly in industries manufacturing secondary battery, display, LED, semiconductor, and other state-of-the-art products, rare earth elements (REEs) remain in demand and such demand has increased drastically. However, due to the lack of alternative materials and recycling technologies for REEs, many countries encounter difficulty in acquiring REEs. As part of the efforts to secure REEs, some studies have developed wet process techniques in the material flow process, particularly for scrapping and disposal. Among these techniques, the agent extraction method and liquid/solid separation process allow the separation/ refinement of high-quality REEs due to their excellent selection and separation performance. This study used Amberite XAD-7HP as the solvent impregnated resin and D2EHPA as the agent to separate each REE from the standard sample solution, mixed with heavy REEs (e.g., La and Ba) and light REEs (e.g., Eu, Tb, and Y). Each one of these REEs was about 100ppm in DI water using extraction chromatography. In this study, the pH change of HCI was between 0.1 and 3N, and the flow speed of the solution was between 0.9 and 2.6ml/min. The extraction result was analyzed by ICP-AES. Each REE was successfully separated with the HCI pH between 0.1N and 1N, and with the speed of the HCI between 1.6 and 2.6m/min.