The flotation tailings obtained from Bor Copper Mine contain pyrite (FeS2) and chalcopyrite (CuFeS2), these sulfide minerals are known to promote acid mine drainage (AMD) which poses a serious threat to the environment and human health. This study focuses on the treatment of mine tailings to convert the AMD supporting minerals to more stable forms, while simultaneously valorizing the mine tailings. A combination of hydrometallurgical processes of high-pressure oxidative leaching (HPOL), solvent extraction (SX), and electrowinning (EW) were utilized to recover copper from mine tailings which contain about 0.3% Cu content. The HPOL process yielded a high copper leaching rate of 94.4% when water was used as a leaching medium. The copper leaching kinetics were promoted by the generation of sulfuric acid due to pyrite oxidation. It was also confirmed that a low iron concentration (1.4 g/L) and a high copper concentration (44.8 g/L) obtained in the stripped solution resulted in an improved copper electrodeposition current efficiency during copper electrowinning. Moreover, pyrite, which is primarily in the mine tailings, was converted into hematite after HPOL. A stability evaluation of the solid residue confirmed almost no elution of metal ions, confirming the reduced environmental loading of mine tailings through re-processing.
Passivation behavior of high silver containing copper anodes was investigated using slowly cooled Cu-1%Ag anodes of diff erent lead (Pb) concentrations. The addition of Pb distributes silver in the Pb phase and reduces the amount of silver that is solidly soluble in copper and, thus, generates a fi ne silver powder on the anode surface which is a main contributing factor of passivation. Electrorefi ning experiments were conducted using a synthetic electrolyte containing 40 g/L Cu 2+ and 180 g/L H 2 SO 4 , at 60°C. SEM-EDS analysis was used to study the resulting anode slime and showed that increasing Pb content altered the anode slime structure from fi ne and compact to porous and less adherent to the anode surface. Utilizing a Cu-1%Ag-0.2%Pb anode yielded the longest passivation time with a low and stable cell voltage of 0.1V. The slime morphology was characterized by precipitated metallic silver particles either as inclusion or loosely present on the surface of the abundant complex Cu-Ag-Pb sulfate type of compounds. Because of the economic importance of silver recovery from the anode slime, understanding its behavior during electrorefi ning will enable operating with high impurity anodes especially in secondary copper processing where metallic impurities can result from e-waste and copper alloy scrap.
In pursuit of carbon neutrality, the demand for metals that are necessary for the development of clean energy technologies is rapidly increasing. Metallurgical waste, such as slag, presents a promising secondary source of these key metals. This research aims to develop an eco-friendly hydrometallurgical process to recover Cu, Ni, and Co from discarded copper/nickel slag. The high-pressure acid leaching (HPAL) was used to selectively leach Ni, Cu, and Co from the fayalite slag, yielding high leaching efficiencies of 99.9%, 89.4%, and 99.9%, respectively, with low Fe and Si tenors to the pregnant leach solution (PLS). The solvent extraction (SX) technique utilizing LIX 984N was used to selectively extract and enrich copper from the dilute PLS to about 23 g/L Cu with a very low Fe concentration of 0.05 g/L. Potassium amyl xanthate (PAX) solution was used to form Ni and Co xanthate complexes from the raffinate solution. Nickel was selectively recovered using ammonia solution, while cobalt xanthate complex was thermally decomposed and recovered as cobalt oxide solids of about 25 wt.% Co. A comprehensive process flowsheet is presented, furthermore, to realize the real application of the developed slag cleaning process, a preliminary economic evaluation was performed.
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