Galdieria Launches the World’s First Commercial Bioadsorbent Platform* for Recovering Palladium at Ultra-Low Concentrations
- Release
- 2026/06/05
Galdieria Co., Ltd. (Head Office: 2-4-2-709 Nihonbashi-Hamacho, Chuo-ku, Tokyo; Representative Director and CEO: Tadashi Tanimoto) today announced that it has installed and commenced full-scale operation of a palladium recovery system using a precious metal adsorbent derived from the microalga Galdieria at Kakihara Industries Co., Ltd. (Head Office: Fukuyama, Hiroshima; Representative Director: Kunihiro Kakihara).
Galdieria has successfully recovered palladium online from plating rinse water under conditions that conventional recovery technologies have struggled to address: strongly acidic, ultra-low-concentration water containing high levels of tin. This is Galdieria’s first commercial deployment in Japan. Building on this success, the company will begin broader deployment of an urban mining solution that converts low-concentration precious metals previously treated as wastewater into resources.
*As an online palladium recovery system using a bioadsorbent for strongly acidic, ultra-low-concentration plating rinse water containing tin, according to Galdieria’s research.
Palladium is a platinum group metal and, like platinum, is an important material widely used in manufacturing processes for automotive parts, electronic components and semiconductor packages. It is used in plating films and as a catalyst for electroless plating to improve contact reliability and corrosion resistance.
Plating rinse water contains trace amounts of palladium. However, recovery using conventional technologies has been difficult because the concentration is extremely low, at approximately 1 mg/L, the water contains many impurities such as tin — more than 100 to 300 times the amount of palladium under conditions confirmed by Galdieria — and the water is strongly acidic, at around pH 1. In many cases, palladium has therefore either been discharged unused or treated as low-value sludge in wastewater treatment processes.
Existing recovery technologies have faced several practical issues, including the need for extensive pretreatment, installation space and changes to the plating process that could deteriorate product quality.
In addition, wastewater treatment is not a core part of the manufacturing process. As a result, the need to install, operate, and maintain complex recovery equipment has often been a barrier to adoption for plating companies.
Galdieria has enabled palladium recovery from wastewater streams that had previously been treated as waste by combining an adsorbent that uses the distinctive metal adsorption properties of the extremophilic microalga Galdieria with a proprietary pretreatment process developed to resolve these issues.
At Kakihara Industries, the system has been introduced for rinse water generated in resin plating processes for automotive parts. Under strongly acidic conditions of around pH 1 and in the presence of tin, the system has succeeded in recovering ultra-low-concentration palladium of approximately 1 mg/L while continuously treating the water without stopping the line, within a limited footprint and without making any changes to the product manufacturing process.
Galdieria has also confirmed that the palladium-bearing adsorbent can be sold to refiners as a precious metal feedstock, creating substantially greater value than conventional wastewater sludge treatment. Rather than simply treating wastewater, the system recovers and monetizes previously lost resources, creating a circular process that converts waste streams into valuable raw materials.
Nippon Denko Co., Ltd., Galdieria’s capital and business alliance partner, has participated in the design and operation of this system through its Aqua Solutions business. By combining Nippon Denko’s water treatment technologies with Galdieria’s bioadsorbent technology, the partners have achieved stable operation at an actual manufacturing plant.
The system is currently operating stably on part of Kakihara Industries’ production lines, and expansion to other lines is under consideration.
Galdieria will expand the application of its technology into plating, electronic components, semiconductor-related fields, precious metal refining, jewellery and related fields. In addition to palladium, the company will also pursue applications for the recovery of gold (Au), platinum (Pt), ruthenium (Ru), iridium (Ir) and other precious and rare metals, with the aim of building circular resource recovery infrastructure.
Tadashi Tanimoto, Representative Director and CEO, Galdieria Co., Ltd.
“The deployment at Kakihara Industries is an important example of our technology functioning effectively in an area where recovery had previously been considered difficult and, in many cases, impractical. Being able to recover palladium under the challenging conditions of strong acidity, ultra-low concentration and the presence of tin opens up new possibilities for turning unrecovered urban mines into resources. Building on our collaboration with Kakihara Industries and Nippon Denko, we will expand our technology across the plating, electronics, and semiconductor industries, advancing a circular resource recovery infrastructure that transforms wastewater into valuable resources.”
Takashi Oro, Manager, New Process Development Office, Kakihara Industries Co., Ltd.
“Environmental protection is one of the areas to which our company gives the greatest emphasis. Developing more environmentally responsible plating processes is an important theme, and we are advancing research and development aimed at reducing the environmental impact of plating processes and promoting resource circulation. Galdieria’s technology has demonstrated the potential for practical use on actual production lines in recovering precious metals from low-concentration rinse water, which has traditionally been difficult to recover. We will continue to accelerate sustainable manufacturing as part of our green transformation (GX) initiatives.”
Taketoshi Oka, Executive Officer responsible for the Aqua Solutions Business, Nippon Denko Co., Ltd.
“Through our collaboration with Galdieria, we are working to implement precious metal recovery systems by applying the water treatment technologies and expertise that Nippon Denko has developed over many years in our Aqua Solutions business. The deployment at Kakihara Industries is positioned as a demonstration of a new resource circulation model that recovers valuable metals from low-concentration, difficult-to-treat wastewater. Building on this case, we will expand this solution beyond plating wastewater to a wide range of industries, contributing to resource circulation and reduced environmental impact.”
Galdieria is developing technologies to address global resource and environmental challenges through research and development of Galdieria, a microalga that lives in hot spring environments.
| Representative | Tadashi Tanimoto, Representative Director and CEO |
| Head office | 2-4-2-709 Nihonbashi-Hamacho, Chuo-ku, Tokyo 103-0007, Japan |
| Tsurumi Laboratory | Leading Venture Plaza Building 2, Room 106, 75-1 Ono-cho, Tsurumi-ku, Yokohama 230-0046, Japan |
| Capital | JPY 529,574,495 |
| Established | 1 October 2015 |
Business activities:
Contact: https://galdieria.com/en/contact-en/
Kakihara Industries is a manufacturing company headquartered in Fukuyama, Hiroshima, with core strengths in resin plating and surface treatment. It has an integrated production system covering mould design, injection moulding, surface treatment, painting and assembly, and provides high-value decorative technologies mainly for automotive parts and other industries.
| Representative | Kunihiro Kakihara, Representative Director |
| Location | 99-13 Minooki-cho, Fukuyama, Hiroshima, Japan |
| Business activities | Resin plating, surface treatment, moulding, painting, assembly and related operations |
Nippon Denko is a diversified manufacturer operating across five business segments: Ferroalloys, Functional Materials, Incineration Ash Recycling, Aqua Solutions and Electric Power. Through its Aqua Solutions business, the company contributes to water and resource circulation by providing industrial wastewater treatment systems, valuable metal recovery systems and pure water production equipment.
| Representative | Yasushi Aoki, President and Representative Director |
| Location | 1-4-16 Yaesu, Chuo-ku, Tokyo, Japan |
| Business activities | Ferroalloys, Functional Materials, Incineration Ash Recycling, Aqua Solutions and Electric Power |