Prospects of Processing Tungsten Ores from the Akchatau Deposit

Abstract

An overview of the composition of wolframite ores of the Akchatau deposit and the technologies for processing concentrates using NaOH and Na2CO3 by hydro- and pyrometallurgical methods is given, and the disadvantages associated with both the technology and the equipment are noted. To develop a technology for processing Akchatau wolframite concentrates, samples of ore materials were taken, the chemical and mineralogical composition of the samples was studied, and enrichment was carried out to obtain rich concentrates. The kinetics of the sintering of the wolframite concentrate with soda was investigated, the dependences of the degree of transformation of the tungsten minerals into sodium tungstate were obtained, and the rate constants, the order of the reaction, and the values of the apparent activation energy were calculated. The results of sintering an enlarged sample of wolframite concentrate with soda in a muffle furnace are presented. After the subsequent leaching, studies were carried out to purify the obtained solutions of sodium tungstate from the impurities while eliminating the operations of the neutralizing solutions through the use of electrodialysis with an MK-40 cation-exchange membrane. The scheme of processing the wolframite ores of Akchatau is proposed.