Abstract
Thiosulfate is a promising alternative lixiviant to poisonous cyanide for gold extraction due to undesirable environmental and safety aspects of the cyanidation techniques. However, high thiosulfate consumption has restricted its widespread commercialization as a technological bottleneck, which must be solved urgently. In this study, an eco-friendly and low-energy innovative scheme of self-generated thiosulfate by atmospheric oxidation was first proposed. Specifically, pyrrhotite, a thermal decomposition product of pyrite (700 °C, 40min), has higher chemical reactivity and can self-generate abundantly thiosulfate (0.30M). Furthermore, compared with hexagonal pyrrhotite, monoclinic pyrrhotite is a better raw material to self-generate thiosulfate because of its higher sulfur content and a more well-developed pore structure by Scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Finally, a preliminary exploration of gold extraction on different types of gold ores has verified that the self-generated thiosulfate can replace conventional sodium thiosulfate. The results we obtained from this study provide significant insight for the commercialization of green gold leaching.
Published Version
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