Removal of copper and uranium from contaminated waters in biosorption columns

It was the aim of this work to investigate the sorption characteristics of the Biocer material that consists of cells of Bacillus sphaericus that are immobilised on a ceramic carrier material, performing column experiments with model waters and real mine drainage waters from a U remediation site in East Germany. In column experiments a nearly quantitative sorption of Cu²⁺ was performed from solutions of different Cu²⁺ concentrations and at different flow rates. The desorption of the Cu²⁺ in the columns was nearly quantitative in a very short time. The columns could be regenerated 16 times without a substantial loss of the sorption capacity of the material. In experiments with U using real drainage waters, a specific U sorption capacity of 2.34 mg/g was determined. By variation of the experimental parameters, the long-term stability and sorption properties of the Biocer columns can be substantially improved.