Abstract
Copper and cobalt demand is projected to be increased from here to 2050 and the challenge is to find treat economically minerals which contains those metals. Several tailings from oxide ores throughout the word contain good grades of copper and cobalt that should be recovered by froth flotation. This paper investigates the recovery of copper and cobalt through reprocessing of spiral classifier tailings by determination of specific reagents dosage. The flotation behaviours of malachite and heterogenite were studied through many roughing and cleaning flotation tests in order to recovery most of copper and cobalt. The effect of specific reagents was be varied and others parameters were kept constant. The highest recoveries of both copper and cobalt in rougher concentrate were respectively 82.51% and 72.51% with grades of 12.52% and 0.99% respectively. However, the cleaner concentrate was 24.54 Cu% and 1.38% Co with recoveries of 69.26 % and 40.7% respectively. It was concluded that the reprocessing of spiral classifier tailings through froth flotation is benefit because it recovers most of desired metal and reduces the risk of their presence on environment through.
Highlights
The Central African Copper Belt in the DemocraticRepublic of Congo and Zambia is one of oxide coppercobalt ores container characterized by the size and quality, which are used in several domains [1]
In Katanga, Democratic Republic of the Congo, about 77% of the copper and 75% of the cobalt were recovered by using sodium hydrosulphide with a concentration ratio of 3.0 [3]. [14] have shown that there is a correlation between malachite recovery and the content of sulfidization products, which are composed of cuprous monosulfide, cuprous disulfide, and cuprous polysulfide
Considering the adoption by several countries of environmental regulations about environment protection against heavy metals [17], [18] and the high grades of copper and cobalt into tailings, this paper aims at recovering those metals from spiral classifier tailings of Kamfundwa by froth flotation using optimal conditions
Summary
The Central African Copper Belt in the DemocraticRepublic of Congo and Zambia is one of oxide coppercobalt ores container characterized by the size and quality, which are used in several domains [1]. The treatment by flotation of copper-cobalt oxide minerals has been studied by several authors [2]-[4]. Malachite (Cu2CO3(OH).H2O), pseudo malachite (Cu5(PO4)2OH4), cuprite (Cu2O), chalcantite (CuSO4.5H2O), azurite (Cu3(OH)2(CO3)2), chrysocolla (CuO.SiO2.2H2O), heterogenite (CoO.2Co2O3.6H2O) are among those minerals Both malachite and hétérogénite are most abundant copper and cobalt oxide minerals respectively. On another hand, [6] has studied the effect of lead nitrate as activator on sulfurizing flotation of a copper-cobalt oxide ore. The two last of the list were more important concerning activity of product
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