Nippon Light Metal Company, Ltd.

Masashi Ojiri

Hiroshi Sano

Kaoru Sugita

Yoshihiro Taguchi

Kazuhiro Oda

Yasushi Kobayashi

Satoshi Takeda

Yuji Ota

Provided is a method of recovering rare-earth elements by which rare-earth elements can be recovered efficiently from a bauxite residue serving as a raw material and containing the rare-earth elements. Specifically provided is a method of recovering rare-earth elements from a raw material, the raw material being a bauxite residue produced as a by-product in a Bayer process, the method including: using a bauxite residue having a specific surface area of 35 m/g or more; adding, to the raw material bauxite residue, a liquid leaching agent formed of an aqueous solution of at least one kind of mineral acid selected from sulfuric acid, hydrochloric acid, nitric acid, and sulfurous acid, thereby preparing a slurry having a liquid-solid ratio of 2 to 30 and a pH of 0.5 to 2.2; subjecting the slurry to leaching treatment of the rare-earth elements under a temperature condition of room temperature to 160&#xb0; C.; subjecting the slurry after the leaching treatment to solid-liquid separation, yielding a leachate; and separating and recovering the rare-earth elements from the leachate.

Method of recovering rare-earth elements

Growing community of inventors

Shizuoka, Japan

Masashi Ojiri