FIRST COMMERCIALISATION OF THE ALBION PROCESS~(TM) FOR COPPER

摘要

Sable Zinc Kabwe Limited ("Sable") is a base metal processing plant two kilometres south of Kabwe Town in Central Province, Zambia. The region has a rich history in mining and minerals production, being a major lead and zinc producer from the 1900's up to the mid-1990s. In 2006, a copper plant was built at the Sable processing site to treat third-party copper and cobalt oxide ores and concentrates. The oxide leaching plant included whole ore leaching, solvent extraction and production of 8,000 tpa LME Grade A copper cathode. The plant was placed on care and maintenance in 2014, and Glencore Pic ("Glencore") took the opportunity to convert the plant using a minimal budget, to an Albion Process~(TM) plant to treat local refractory copper concentrates unsuitable or uneconomic for smelting. The Albion Process~(TM) plant comprises an M100 IsaMill~(TM) operating in acidic conditions such that raffinate from the downstream process is recycled back to slurry the concentrate delivered to site thus maximising copper tenor in solution and reducing water consumption. The finely ground concentrate feeds an oxidative leaching plant using the existing stainless steel oxide leach reactors converted to Albion Process~(TM) duty by fitting HyperSparge~(TM) supersonic oxygen injectors and gas dispersing agitators. The leached slurry is then directed to the existing solid/liquid separation equipment and the PLS is then sent to the existing SX/EW plant. The plant also allows for cobalt recovery from the raffinate. The plant was designed based on testwork on regional copper concentrates. The plant was designed to toll treat a range of concentrates and so the design was flexible with the flexibility of the Albion Process~(TM) being one of its distinct advantages, the plant was ideally suited for tolling regional concentrates. The plant was commissioned and ramped up in six weeks using low grade Zambian copper concentrate, and produced exclusively LME Grade A copper with over 99% leach recovery in the Albion Process~(TM) circuit.