Research Progress on Treatment and Recovery of Metals in Wastewater by Electrodeposition

Heavy metal wastewater poses a threat to human health and biodiversity. Among the treatment techniques, electrodeposition technique has attracted much attention in the removal and recovery of metal ions in wastewater because of its cleanliness, wide range of uses and high stability. It is found that the papers on metal recovery by electrodeposition at home and abroad have shown an upward trend in the past decade, indicating that electrodeposition technique is still one of the hotspots in current study and has great research potential in wastewater treatment. However, the single electrodeposition process has great limitations, so it is necessary to couple it with other processes to improve metal recovery and reduce energy consumption. In this paper, the core factors affecting metal recovery by electrodeposition were analyzed, including electrode material, electrochemical reactor design, operation parameters and influent quality. Then, the research progress on the coupling of electrodeposition with other electrochemical methods, membrane process, ultrasound, adsorption/extraction and other processes was further summarized. Finally, the problems and challenges of metal recovery by electrodeposition were discussed, and the future development direction of metal recovery by electrodeposition was put forward.