ION FLOTATION OF TUNGSTEN AND MOLYBDENUM FROM THE LIQUID PHASE OF A TAILINGS DUMP

摘要

Ion flotation represents a potential approach for additional recovery of rare metais from the liquid wastes of mining-metallurgical enterprises [1]. The process is effective at relatively low metals concentrations in solutions (from units to hundreds of milligrams per liter) and has a high productivity: when an appropriate reagent system is used, a 90-99 percent recovery can be attained in several minutes. In earlier published works [1-3], detailed consideration was given to a technology, developed at IPKON AN SSSR, for ion flotation of tungsten and molybdenum, as well as to its physico-chemical bases and apparatus formulation. The technology was tested at the Uzbek Combine of Refractory and Heat Resistant Metals (UzKTZhM) [4]. In 1986 it was introduced to the Nal'chik Hydrometallurgical Plant (NGMZ) for additional extraction of water-soluble compounds of tungsten and molybdenum, which tended to be lost with the discard cakes from autoclave-soda leaching [2, 3]. In 1987, in the ion flotation section of the NGMZ, about 18 tons of WO_3 and 0.9 tons of Mo were additionally extracted.