Preliminary experimental research for silver recovery from radiographic films

Global demand for silver remains steadily to about 1,000 million ounces (28349500 kg), of which around 600 million ounces (17009700 kg) are used in industrial applications. Extraction of silver from the ore is expensive and harmful to the environment and low efficiency. X-ray films represent an important worldwide consumer as research on recovery of silver from exposed radiographic films must be oriented to achieve a maximum recovery and a high purity silver, with methods through the by-products will be less polluting for the environment. The paper presents some laboratory tests referring to the recovery of silver from radiographic films by leaching with sodium hydroxide. Two series of experiments were performed with different amounts of used X-ray film.