Abstract
The agglomerate microstructure determines the performance of the agglomerates in heap leaching. However, a detailed analysis of the agglomerate microstructure is still highly desirable. The purpose of this paper is to conduct a comprehensive analysis of the agglomerate microstructure to guide the agglomeration process. In this work, the microstructure of agglomerates prepared by geopolymerization was studied in detail. Besides, the effect of the agglomerate microstructure on leaching was verified by column bioleaching tests. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) tests indicated that geopolymer gel mainly bound the particles in agglomerates prepared by geopolymerization, and X-ray diffraction (XRD) and energy dispersive spectra (EDS) tests showed that the aluminosilicate in the ore hardly participated in geopolymerization. X-ray microtomography (XMT) test showed that there were many pores and cracks between particles in the agglomerates prepared by geopolymerization. The column bioleaching tests revealed that the agglomerates were quite stable, and the permeability and copper extraction of the agglomerates were still higher than that of the ore with the same particle size distribution. These results demonstrated that the agglomerates prepared by geopolymerization had a microstructure suitable for heap leaching.
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