Roasting of lead and zinc sulfide ore in water vapor

The study intends to develop a new nonmechanical method for the selective disintegration of complex minerals based on roasting of lead and zinc sulfide ore in water vapor. Complex ores mostly feature higher contents of difficult and oxidized minerals, and close interpenetration of sulfide minerals. As a rule, such sulfide ore is subjected to dissociation by very fine grinding (to 2–50 μm) before flotation. Higher efficiency of processing of difficult lead and zinc sulfide ore is achievable through preliminary roasting of the ore in water vapor prior to flotation. The investigation of compositions and physicochemical properties of primary ore and roasting products used the X-ray spectral microanalysis, photon correlation spectroscopy (for the particle size analysis) and X-ray phase analysis. Physicochemical modeling of the sulfide ore–water vapor system components used the universal program Terra designed for determining equilibrium parameters of multi-component heterogeneous systems. The studies show that roasting of lead and zinc sulfide ore in water vapor at the temperature of 650–700 °C initiates selective oxidation of pyrite with formation of magnetite and hydrogen sulfide, while lead and zinc sulfides remain intact. The experiments find out that oxidation of pyrite goes with disintegration along the interfaces of lead and zinc. The roasted products are mainly ZnS, PbS, Fe3O4, SiO2 and CaCO3, which largely facilities further flotation.

Antropova I. G., Gulyashinov P. A., Merinov A. A. Roasting of lead and zinc sulfide ore in water vapor. MIAB. Mining Inf. Anal. Bull. 2021;(11):56-67. [In Russ]. DOI: 10.25018/0236_1493_2021_11_0_56.

I.G. Antropova¹, Cand. Sci. (Eng.), Head of Laboratory, e-mail: inan@binm.ru,
P.A. Gulyashinov¹, Cand. Sci. (Eng.), Researcher, e-mail: gulpasha@mail.ru,
A.A. Merinov¹, Engineer, e-mail: artemerinov@yandex.ru,
¹ Baikal Institute of Nature Management, Siberian Branch of Russian Academy of Sciences, 670047, Ulan-Ude, Russia.

P.A. Gulyashinov, e-mail: gulpasha@mail.ru.

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