Optimization of pulp and acid leaching operations in zinc ingot production process with the data mining approach

Abstract

This study presents a data mining approach to optimize the chemical processes. Typically, these processes are affected by a variety of interactive variables. So, their quality monitoring and detection usually emphasize changing main variables and their interaction effects. Sometimes, the input to the chemical processes lacks access to the raw materials, which causes the manufacturers to use residue instead of high-quality materials. The use of residue has flaws, most notably the low quality of the process output. In this paper, calculating the optimum points of process variables using residue with the data mining approach is suggested. As a real case, one of the operations of the zinc ingot production process, i.e., pulp and acid leaching operations, are studied. In this way, first, by studying the operation in detail, the required data are collected, and key input and output variables are distinguished. Then, by data pre-processing, the optimum points of the process are determined using data mining algorithms. Therefore, the input variable settings of the operation are extracted to optimize the output variables. To validate the results, a set of test data are used to examine the two periods before and after the variable settings. The results show that the operation output is improved significantly. According to the robustness of the proposed method, it can be used as a benchmark for other chemical processes.