SECONDARY COPPER PROCESSING IN PRIMARY SMELTERS ITS IMPLICATION TO THE SECONDARY COPPER INDUSTRY

摘要

Traditionally, secondary copper has been processed by the dedicated secondary copper smelting process, although, for already a long time, unalloyed copper scrap has favourably been used as coolant in primary copper matte converting. Based on the advance of new copper smelting technologies and the positive economics, resulting from the substitution of part of the copper concentrate feed to primary smelters by secondaries, the increased input of secondary materials into primary smelters, with or without additional dedicated process steps, has been observed. The tendency of integration of processing of secondary copper materials, particularly of electronic scrap, in primary smelters will increase in the future. This is raising the question of what will be the growth of the secondary copper smelter in view of the expected increased arisings ofend-of-iife scrap. The due restructurisation of the Chinese secondary copper industry, producing statistically almost 50 % of worldwide secondary refined copper, is thereby believed to be a relevant factor.