Recovery of Cobalt from leach solution of spent oil Hydrodesulphurization catalyst using a synergistic system consisting of Versatic™ 10 and Cyanex®272

Catalyst are often used in the petroleum refinery industry, especially cobalt-based catalyst such as CoMoX. Every year, Indonesia's oil industry produces around 1350 tons of spent hydrodesulphurization catalyst in which cobalt makes up for 7% wt. of them. Cobalt is a non-renewable and highly valuable resource. Taking into account the aforementioned reasons, this research was made to recover cobalt from spent hydrodesulphurization catalyst so that it can be reused by industries needing them. The methods used in the recovery of cobalt from the waste catalyst leach solution are liquid-liquid extraction using a synergistic system of Versatic (TM) 10 and Cyanex (R) 272. Based on the experiments done using the aforementioned methods and materials, the optimum condition for the extraction process: concentration of Versatic (TM) 10 of 0.35 M, Cyanex (R) 272 of 0.25 M, temperature of 23-25oC (room temperature), and pH of 6 with an extraction percentage of 98.80% and co-extraction of Ni at 93.51%.