Antimony and gold substance flows analysis of pyrometallurgical process for antimony-gold concentrates

Abstract

In this paper, substance flow analysis was used to analyze the production of antimony and gold in the pyrometallurgical process of complex antimony and gold concentrate. The comprehensive recovery and utilization of antimony and gold concentrate were studied in detail by establishing antimony and gold mass balance accounts and substance flow charts. The results showed that the resource efficiency of antimony and gold was 88.85% and 94.86%, respectively. The direct recovery of antimony in the blast furnace, gold smelting furnace, cupellation furnace and reverberatory furnace was 95.44%, 84.95%, 85.11% and 91.22%, respectively. The circular substance flow generated by the cupellation furnace accounted for 72.6% of the total circulation flow. One tonne of antimony accompanied 0.016 tonnes of antimony into water-quenched slag and 0.017 tonnes into the arsenic alkali slag. The proportion of gold entering antimony oxide, precious antimony, antimony matte and water-quenched slag in the blast furnace was 8.4%, 84%, 6.7% and 0.9%, respectively. The proportion of gold entering the gold-bearing products, antimony oxide and antimony slag in gold smelting furnace was 90.6%, 3.6% and 5.8%, respectively.