Abstract
Lepidolite is an important mineral resource of lithium, rubidium and cesium. Lithium, rubidium and cesium were extracted simultaneously from a lepidolite concentrate by sulfuric acid baking and water leaching. A crystallization-roasting-dissolution-solvent extraction process was developed to recover cesium from the leach solution in this study. During crystallization, leach solution was cooled from 85 °C to 35 °C firstly to precipitate most parts of Rb+ with 98.65% and Cs+ with 94.59% in the form of RbAl(SO4)2·xH2O and RbAl(SO4)2·xH2O, respectively. The mixed alums were then roasted at 900 °C to decompose them into Cs2SO4, Rb2SO4, K2SO4 and Al2O3. Next, a mixed sulfates solution with 12.51 g/L Rb+ and 2.4 g/L Cs+ was obtained by water dissolution of the roasted alums. Cesium was then separated from the solution by solvent extraction, scrubbing and stripping. A Cs-loaded organic phase with 4.66 g/L Cs+ and 3.05 g/L Rb+ was obtained after a four-stage countercurrent extraction. Around 99.20% of Cs+ and 10.44% of Rb+ were extracted by using 4-tert-butyl-2-(α-methylbenzyl) phenol (t-BAMBP). After scrubbing and stripping of the Cs-loaded organic phase by diluted H2SO4, a cesium sulfate solution of 16.6 g/L Cs+ was obtained. A cesium sulfate product with a purity of 98.47 wt% was then recovered by evaporation and crystallization of the stripping solution
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