Abstract
Increasing the recovery of the niobium metal contained in the Nelsonite rocks presents a great challenge, considering the standards and the production targets of the China Molybdenum Company (CMOC) that produces phosphate and with tailings material, concentrate niobium minerals. At Chapadão mine, located in Goiás, a mid-west Brazilâs state, the weathering profile reaches up to 100 meters and the ore is subdivided into three basic types, from top to bottom: Oxidized (OX), Top Micaceous (TM) and Base Micaceous (BM). In this study, samples from these three main bodies of Nelsonite were collected and tested in laboratory scale to identify which weathering level is more favourable to niobium concentrate production. In the niobium concentration process, there can be metal losses that can jeopardize the recovery of the niobium crystals. To evaluate these losses microscopy analysis was performed using samples from industrial plant survery. The results from flotation batch tests showed that BM presented the higher mass recovery and production capacity. According to the mineralogical results the main niobium losses were identified in the barite concentrate from apatite circuit and in the screening stage in the Niobium Plant feed. The batch test results showed that adjusting the cut size of the Niobium Plant there is a potential niobium recovery upgraded to 90% from Ba-pyrochlore, and, adding the barite concentrate product as an additional mass in the tailings feed, it will result together in more than 1 t/day of niobium concentrate final product, reducing the losses and utilizing better the ore blend recovery potential.
Highlights
There are different definitions of geometallurgy in the literature, but most of them include geology, mining and metallurgy in some way [1,2,3,4,5,6]
In the niobium concentration process, there can be metal losses that can impair the best recovery of the niobium crystals
According to the picture below it was possible to see that the principal ore minerals are in great majority free from intrusions and the apatite, quartz and pyrochlore minerals have a nice liberation grade percentage, what is favourable for the concentrate production mass
Summary
There are different definitions of geometallurgy in the literature, but most of them include geology, mining and metallurgy in some way [1,2,3,4,5,6]. Nelsonites are known to be rocks of magmatic origin from correlated magmas with carbonatitic mantel plumes and are basically composed of magnetite, apatite and phlogopite, in this order of mineral predominance [7]. Depending on their temporal formation, it is possible to observe different structure, mineralogy, particle size or texture in different nelsonitic bodies, as showed in the Figure 1 [8]. This lithology contains various valuable minerals such as apatite (phosphate), magnetite (iron), pyrochlore (niobium), rare earth minerals and more rarely chalcopyrite-bornite (copper). The carbonate complexes of Araxá and Catalão are richest in which the nelsonitic rocks are mineralized in pyrochlore [9]
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