Producing High Purity Nickel Metal Powder from Nickel Wastes through Acidic Leaching by Sulfuric Acid

Nickel has found increasing application in electronic, automobilemanufacturing, plating, and metal industries and so on. Producing highquality metal powders to satisfy increasing demand for advanced materialsis of very high importance. There are a few numbers of standard powderproduction techniques. An acidic leaching has been applied in presentresearch. Sulfuric acid has been used to leach nickel wastes of platingindustry. To produce nickel oxide powder furnaces with no protectingatmosphere and to produce pure nickel powder, tube furnace with hydrogenatmosphere has been applied. Variables performed in the research aretime, density of sulfuric acid, and amount of hydrogen peroxide. Toanalyze powders produced, EDS element analysis and to determine size ofpowder particles, SEM has been applied. It was shown by the results thatthe highest amount of nickel dissolution in sulfuric acid (98%) has takenplace during one hour and there is a direct relationship between hydrogenperoxide amount and nickel dissolution in sulfuric acid.