Biotechnology is currently playing an important role in sustainable development, and advances in this field are, in fact, among today’s most cutting-edge scientific contributions. Nevertheless, they are not free from waste generation. This research studies the viability of two alternatives for treating the depleted solutions obtained in the biomachining of copper pieces, paying special attention to the recovery of copper. The precipitation alternative of increasing the pH value required the preliminary oxidation of Fe²⁺, iron precipitation and filtration, and finally, Cu precipitation (as CuO) and filtration. The recovery was quantitative but time-consuming, and the reagent’s overall cost was 1.69 €/L. The electrorecovery alternative also required the oxidation and precipitation of iron before copper deposition (as Cu⁰) at a constant voltage. This deposition was also quantitative, but faster than the recovery at a constant current (14 min versus 20 min). The reagent’s cost was 1.54 €/L, and the copper electrodeposition’s energy cost was 3.6 times lower than the cost of the raw metal, which made the electrochemical treatment viable, affordable and sustainable.

生物技术目前在可持续发展中发挥着重要作用，事实上，该领域的进步是当今最前沿的科学贡献之一。然而，它们并非没有废物的产生。这项研究研究了处理铜片生物加工中获得的贫化溶液的两种替代方法的可行性，并特别注意了铜的回收率。增加pH值的沉淀方法需要Fe ²⁺的初步氧化，铁沉淀和过滤，最后是铜沉淀（以CuO形式）和过滤。回收是定量的但很费时，试剂的总成本为1.69€/ L。电回收的替代方案还要求在铜以恒定电压沉积（如Cu ⁰）之前先进行铁的氧化和沉淀。该沉积也是定量的，但是比恒定电流下的恢复快（14分钟对20分钟）。试剂的成本为1.54€/ L，电沉积铜的能源成本比原金属成本低3.6倍，这使电化学处理可行，可承受且可持续。