IMPROVEMENTS IN FLOTATION COLUMN RECOVERY USING CELL-TO-CELL CIRCUITRY

摘要

A recent survey showed that industrial column flotation circuits improve coal quality, but often suffer from low recoveries. In light of this problem, field measurements of slurry residence time were made at an industrial column facility. These measurements showed that full-scale columns typically operate with longer residence times than conventional cells. However, the longer residence times do not always translate into higher coal recoveries due to short-circuiting of floatable particles to tailings. Mathematical calculations indicated that one way to minimize this inherent shortcoming would be to reconfigure multiple columns to operate as a cell-to-cell circuit. After incorporating this change at the plant site, the column flotation recovery improved as predicted by the mathematical projections. This low-cost modification was found to have a significant impact on the profitability of the column flotation plant.