carbonate or sodium bicarbonate and the sulfite being precipitated by reaction with barium however the heavy metal impurities are not removed by the above process these heavy metal impurities which can be tolerated in an electrolytic cell having a prior art asbestos diaphragm reduce the electrolytic efficiency of the permionic membrane cell and increase the voltage drop across the permionic membrane according to the method of this invention the heavy metal impurities are removed from the brine by adding a flocculent such as iron to the depleted brine fortifying the brine while increasing its ph into the basic range and thereafter adjusting the ph of the brine to approximately ph 7 in order to flocculate the vanadium according to a preferred exemplification the ph is first reduced to the strongly acid region e g a ph of 1 5 to 4 5 and then adjusted to ph 7 to flocculate the vanadium the method of this invention may be understood by reference to the figure appended hereto the figure shows a flow chart for the process a brine line 3 containing depleted brine goes from the cell 1 to a dechlorinator 5 where hydrochloric acid is added to the depleted brine in order to remove the chlorine therefrom the dechlorinated depleted brine then passes to a dissolver or resaturator 7 where solid salt refortifies the brine e g to a level of 315 to about 325 grams per liter sodium chloride this refortified brine then passes from the dissolver or resaturator 7 to a neutralizer 9 where sodium hydroxide addition occurs the neutralized brine having a ph of from about 7 to about 10 next goes to a precipitator where barium ions typically in the form of barium carbonate carbonate.