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Copper Recovery Through Smelter Slag Flotation in Atacama, Chile: An Industrial Case Study
Recuperación de cobre mediante flotación de escorias de fundición en Atacama, Chile: un estudio de caso industrial
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.15446/ing.investig.v41n1.84162Keywords:
Copper slag, flotation, concentrate smelting (en)Escoria de cobre, flotación, fusión de concentrados (es)
Copper slag flotation was studied on an industrial scale at a concentrator plant in the region of Atacama, Chile. This study consisted of the physical, chemical, and mineralogical characterization of the copper slag, along with preliminary flotation tests. This article focuses on industrial flotation, which consisted of two oneyear campaigns (2016 and 2017). The first campaign was carried out using an existing copper slag flotation circuit in the plant. During the second campaign (2017), a circuit for sulfide ore flotation with an additional columnar flotation cleaning stage was evaluated. Results showed an improvement in metallurgical parameters on the second campaign (including improvements in processing capacity, concentrate copper grade, and metallurgical recovery). From the industrial copper slag flotation campaigns, it was concluded that it is possible to obtain a commercialquality copper concentrate, suitable for further processing in a copper smelter. This mitigates certain environmental impacts of copper processing.
Se estudió la flotación industrial de cobre en una planta concentradora de la Región de Atacama, Chile. El estudio consistió en la caracterización física, química y mineralógica de la escoria de cobre, además de las pruebas preliminares de flotación. Este artículo se enfoca en la flotación a nivel industrial, la cual consistió en dos campañas de un año cada una (2016 y 2017). En la campaña del 2016 se utilizó un circuito de flotación de escorias existente en la planta. Para la segunda campaña (2017), se utilizó un circuito de flotación de súlfuros, más una etapa adicional de limpieza mediante flotación columnar. Los resultados mostraron un mejor desempeño en la segunda campaña respecto a la primera, al evaluar los parámetros metalúrgicos tales como: capacidad de procesamiento, ley de cobre y recuperación metalúrgica. De los resultados de las campañas a nivel industrial se concluye que, mediante la flotación de escorias de cobre, es posible obtener un concentrado de calidad adecuada para su posterior procesamiento en una fundición.
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Copyright (c) 2020 Osvaldo Pavez, Pablo Herrera, Miguel González, Oscar Rivera
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