Effect of Thermal Treatment of Clayey Diatomite at Temperature Range 800-1200°C

Abstract

Trepel is the local name for a mixture of diatomaceous earth and clay minerals. It represents a greyish, soft, very light, weakly cemented, fine biogenetic sedimentary rock. The studied material is taken from the vicinity of Bitola city (Republic of Macedonia). Here, clayey diatomite was treated up to three temperature intervals (800, 1000 and 1200 o C) for a period of 1 hour. The X-ray powder diffraction results indicate the presence of both an amorphous phase and the following crystalline phases: quartz, feldspars (plagioclase), mica (muscovite) and chlorites. The results of SEM analysis revealed skeletons of alga Diatomeae with nano-pores. By thermal treatment of the samples, a gradual change in color as well as higher bulk density and compressive strength was observed. The increase of the temperature, in addition, affected the mineralogical composition and increased the presence of the amorphous phase (aluminasilicate glassy phase). SEM results of the thermally investigated samples depicted morphological changes expressed by shrinkage of the pore diameters in comparison to the initial material. The major and minor constituents were established by chemical analysis revealing the following chemical composition of raw clayey diatomite: SiO 2 (63.65 wt%), Al 2 O 3 (11.76 wt%), Fe 2 O 3 (5.93 wt%), MnO (0.13 wt%), TiO 2 (0.63 wt%), CaO (1.42 wt%), MgO (2.22 wt%), P 2 O 5 (0.11 wt%), K 2 O (1.63 wt%), Na 2 O (0.92 wt%), LOI (11.50 wt%).