Abstract
The increasing demand for renewable energy technologies, coupled with the limited natural reserves of platinum group metals (PGMs), has intensified the need to recover and recycle valuable materials from secondary sources. This study investigates the recovery of platinum (Pt) from end-of-life membrane electrode assemblies for potential reuse in energy-related applications. Platinum dissolution was performed using concentrated hydrochloric acid (12 M HCl, 37%) in combination with oxidizing agents consisting of 10% (v/v) nitric acid (HNO3, 65%) and 10% (v/v) hydrogen peroxide (H2O2, 30%) at acid-to-oxidant volumetric ratios of 3:1 and 1:3. The influence of acid concentration and oxidant selection on Pt recovery and recovered material properties was evaluated. The leaching experiments produced 3.09 g and 2.95 g for the HCl–H2O2 system and 1.43 g and 2.84 g for the HCl–HNO3 system at 3:1 and 1:3 ratios,