Study on properties of gossan ore from zinc sulfide deposit

Abstract

Because of its complex composition, low content of valuable metals and high development cost, the gossan ore has not been paid much attention by scholars at home and abroad. In this paper, the properties of gossan ore from zinc sulfide deposit were studied by the methods of mineralogical analysis, BET analysis and SEM/EDS analysis. The results show that the studied ore is typical zinc-bearing gossan type ore. The main elements in the gossan ore are zinc and iron, as well as a certain amount of silicon. The iron mineral of ore is limonite, most of which are monomers, a few connected with clay, dolomite and so on, and are closely adhered with some siderite, which generally contains zinc. Zinc minerals are mainly smithsonite and hemimorphite, a small amount of sphalerite, zinc mica, most of the siderite and limonite symbiosis. The nitrogen adsorption-desorption isotherm of the gossan ore is a typical type III isotherm, and the isotherm is concave and has no inflexion, which shows that the interaction of adsorbents is stronger than that of adsorbents and materials. The specific surface area of gossan ore is small, mainly composed of micro-pores, the smaller specific surface area and pore volume limit its adsorption capacity, which intimates that the untreated gossan ore is not a good adsorbent. The gossan ore particles are composed of many irregular crystal particles with uniform size and many large pore channels appear in the gossan ore particles. The particles are smaller and more dispersed, and that the interconnections between larger particles are mainly caused by the direct interaction of some smaller particles. This research will lay a theoretical basis for the follow-up development and utilization of the gossan ore.