International Cooperation on Biohydrometallurgy

The overall objective of the pre-project is to develop long term research cooperation with India on the topic of biohydrometallurgy, processing of rare earth elements (REE) and remediation of metal contaminants. Simultaneously, establishing a network with in Nordic countries shall also be addressed to strengthen Norwegian competence on the field. The pre-project shall involve e-mail exchanges, visiting Indian partners and organizing workshop to exchange knowledge and discuss potential cooperation topics. In the early phase of the pre-project, the contacts with potential partners will be established, and followed by the visits to the partner in India. In the later phase, the state of the art of respective technologies and their relevance to Norwegian and I ndian mining industry shall be carried out on the following topics: bioleaching of base metals, REE from minerals and mining wastes; application of biogenic sulphide for recovery and removal of metal from wastewater and acid mine drainage; and other metho ds for treatment of metal contaminated soils and waters. A dialog workshop shall be organized in Northern Norway with involvement of expertise from India, Swedish, Finland and Norway with the aim to exchange knowledge on the field and also to evaluate and determine focused topics for the main research project applications. This step is important since it shall decide which topics have potential for long term research development and innovation in both Norway and India.