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By Tim B. Vander Wood

Standard methods of determining clay mineral powder aspect ratios involve manual scanning electron microscopy analyses of shadowed particles in order to measure both platelet thickness and diameter. We present a method whereby the diameters of platelets are quickly determined by automated scanning electron microscopy and their images are recorded and digitally transferred to a transmission electron microscope equipped for parallel electron energy loss spectroscopy. Thickness' of platelets whose diameters are known from the previous analyses are determined by measurement of the ratio of scattered and unscattered electrons in the beam after it has been transmitted through the platelet.

Jan 1, 1995

By Katsuyoshi Tatenuma

"In order to mitigate the effect of global warming by preventing the accumulation of atmospheric CO2, a permanent fixation method of surplus CO2 as an insoluble mineral onto the sea bottom is proposed. As the proposed reduction method of atmospheric CO2, the concrete concept of this method is to form an insoluble carbonate mineral (CaCO3) by direct electrolysis of the seawater; Ca2++2HCO3 -+OH- ? ?CaCO3(insoluble)+CO3 2- (soluble)+H++H2O <not as coral reef reaction>, are directly disposed of itself onto the sea bottom. By this treatment, a concentration of carbonate is reduced in the section of superficial seawater, and therefore the absorption capacity of atmospheric CO2 increases depending upon the shift of chemical carbon equilibrium between the mass of superficial seawater and the atmosphere. As no additives are required, or no secondary waste are produced, the proposed method assuming as green-orientated, has possibility to resolve fundamentally the problem of global warming in a green orientate manner.IntroductionRecently, the amount of atmospheric CO2 has been exponentially increasing and it is a main greenhouse effect gas causing the global warming [1, 2]. The concentration of atmospheric CO2 has increased more than 30% (370ppm in 2001) during only last two centuries, therefore approximately 750 Gton-C of CO2 currently exist in the atmosphere, in which 180 Gton-C of CO2 are accounted for the increment during two centuries [1, 3, 4]. In order to avoid the progressive increase of CO2 global abundance, 3 Gton-C of the incrementing amount per year [4], have to be removed annually from the atmosphere."

Jan 1, 2008

By John Dasher

One of our War Plants processed Bolivian concentrates as low as 17% Sn by the Arnhem process (pressure leach with HCL) and sent the waste acid down a ditch to Galveston Bay where the chlorides, mostly iron, hydrolyzed. Oyster men, and Texas, demandedimpoundment until a disposal process could be developed. A recycle process found by lab work was recommended, piloted and a plant built. This involved cementation of As Sb, Cu, Bi and Ag on light moving scrap iron and of Sn & Pb on Al turnings (then not recyclable), evaporation and crystallization of hydrous FeCl2, roasting crystals in a muffle furnace and absorbing HCI for reuse. The residue from leaching the low grade concentrates was floated to remove undissolved sulfides, classified and passed over sand and slimes tables to get a smeltable concentrate, a discardable sand tail and a slimes tail worth treating After desliming at 2 micro meters cassiterite, oxide flotation gave good, lab results; but commercial equipment wasn&apos;t adequate then. Chloride volatilization, with or without smelting gave high recoveries of Sn as SnCl2, whose marketing was questionable. I have heard this was finally fluxed and smelted.

Jan 1, 1992

By François Tremblay

It is well known that removal of organic material such ,as Jacquer, paint, plastic prior to melting improves aluminum recovery. In addition to being an important economically, decoating of aluminum scrap has a positive impact on the environment, through better control of gaseous emissions. Most of the existing thermal decoaters for aluminum have been designed to operate with scrap containing a level of organic material lower than 10%. The main field of their present application is for recycling of used aluminum can, where levels of organic material are lower than 4%. Alcan has recently developed a new thermal decoating system in order to extend applications of this process to a much wider variety of aluminum scrap. The new decoater efficiently processes aluminum scrap with a level of organic material up to 50%. This new technology features the use of fluidized bed technology to thermally control the process. This innovative feature improves both performance and control over conventional delacquering systems based on hot air convection. This paper describes the basic principles of the technology and the design of the? first industrial unit commissioned by the Alcan Recycling plant in Shelbyville (TN) at the beginning of 1994. Typical applications and operating advantages are discussed.

Jan 1, 1995

By Drew Sinha

Success of the environmentally benign semiconductor manufacturing depends on the cost-effective integration of the principles of reduce, recover, reuse and recycle from source material to final product disposal. Increasing demand combined with current shortage of polysilicon provided unique opportunities to recover the silicon waste, caused by various defects, in wafer manufacturing process. Current practices relating to recovery and reuse of waste silicon produced, from crystal growth process to finally polished and epitaxially deposited silicon wafer, at Mitsubishi Silicon America is presented. Future plan to recycle the process generated silicon fines produced during the intermediate steps of the wafer manufacturing process such as grinding, slicing, lapping and polishing is also discussed.

Jan 1, 1998

By Levente Becze

The zinc bottom dross is obtained as a by-product from hot dip galvanizing operations and contains at least 92 % zinc, which is recycled mainly by pyrometallurgical processes. The overall costs of such a treatment, however, are often relatively high, and the very strict environmental protection regulations might also cause additional difficulties for the high temperature procedures in the future. Therefore, a novel hydro-electrometallurgical process has been developed in our laboratory, by which one can reclaim zinc of high purity, while attempting to achieve low energy consumption and making allowances for all the environmental restrictions. This aqueous processing technique, based on electrolytic refining in a cell equipped with anion-exchange membrane to separate the anode and cathode compartments, allows the indirect purification of the anolyte. Zinc is dissolved from the anode along with some of the impurity elements, while the intermetallic compounds (Fe-Zn, Fe-AI- Zn) are accumulated in the anode slime.

Jan 1, 2003

By Peter Hayes, Evgueni Jak, Ata Fallah Mehrjardi

Modern analytical tools, such as electron probe X-ray microanalysis (EPMA), are used in experimental characterization of phase equilibria and microstructures of complex slags. Integrated thermodynamic computer packages, such as FactSage, are used to provide more accurate descriptions of complex slag systems. These advanced methodologies have been applied to characterize dynamic steady state freeze linings in slag systems using submerged cold finger probes at controlled laboratory conditions, establishing the effects of bath chemistry, temperature, heat extraction rate and bulk fluid flow. It has been found that stationary freeze lining deposit interface temperatures at steady state conditions can be lower than the bulk slag liquidus temperature, and that stable operation below the liquidus is possible. A conceptual framework has been developed to explain the phenomenon and the range of interface temperatures that can be obtained in dynamic steady state conditions. These findings have important implications for the design of freeze linings and possible improvements to high-temperature metallurgical operations.

Jan 1, 2014

By S. I. Sobol

Completeness of cobalt recovery from slag requires decomposition of maggemite and non - ferrous metal desorption with polymerized silicon-acid. Cobalt losses are reduced in leaching tai1s up to 200 g/t of iron.

Jan 1, 1993

By Yafei Xiong, Yue Wang, Guotao Xu, Shuzhong Li, Huaiyuan Li

"The composition, properties and structure of taphole clay with high strength and friendly surrounding used in a new blast furnace with 3800 M3 volume was studied. The developed taphole clay had been applied in the blast furnace for four months, pouring times were 11-13 every day, flowing rate of hot iron was 7.5 t/min and the consumption of taphole clay was 0.49Kg per ton iron, which can make the new blast furnace attach the designed production quickly and decrease the cost of hot iron. The taphole clay is easy to be opened in the channel of hot iron which can be remained in stable shape under the corrosion of slag or hot iron, and it dose not produce poisonous smoke in yellow or dark color in the use process. The development of new taphole clay is useful to improve the work surrounding of the blast furnace.IntroductionIn the iron-making process, the taphole clay's function is filling up the taphole and protecting the formation as well as the growth of the clay in the blast furnace, maintaining the enough taphole depth; simultaneously it is easily to open a hole and knock out the clay. The taphole clay has a good performance of molten slag and hot iron resistance. The traditional taphole clay uses coal tar or carbolineum as a binder, and the performance of taphole clay is good, but it has the black and yellow poisonous smoke, which is harmful for work condition. Through the investigation on the binder's composition and poisonous performance of taphole clay, the environmental taphole clay is developed by some foreign companies, which is named the third generation product with benzene is less than 300ppm, and it has been used in European steel companies. This application of the taphole clay with high strength and environment-friendly using in 3800m3 blast furnace is introduced and the performance is discussed and analyzed in this paper."

Jan 1, 2012

By Richard D. Hagni

An enhanced Interest in pyrometallurgical dusts has recently emerged due to increased world-wide environmental concerns. Mineralogical study of dusts samples from lead sinter plants. lead smelters, and secondary steel mill electric arc furnaces has shown that they can be readily studied by reflected light microscopy. These dusts typically are composed of small particles sufficiently large that their mineralogical identification and characterization can be conducted under the reflecting light microscope. Scanning electron microscope-energy dispersive spectroscopic analysis (SEM-EDS) has been used to confirm optical identifications and chemical compositions. The sinter and blast furnace dusts at the Doe Run Smelter at Herculaneum, Missouri are commonly about 20-150 11m. They consist predominantly of galena, chalcopyrite, sinter. slag. coke. and particles. Dusts from remote sampling sites 112-1 mile from the lead smelter are composed of similar particles and abundant fine-grained particles, less than 10 um. of locally derived calcium-aluminum silicates. Electric arc furnace (EAF) dusts are mostly spherical and less than 10 11m. They consist predominantly of iron oxides (magnetite. franklinite. jacobsite and solid solutions of these spinels), zincite. and calcium-iron silicate glass, together with smaller amounts of hematite. sylvite. coke and metallic iron. Reflected light microscopy is rapid provides mineralogical data on individual grains within dust particles. and allows direct observations of textural intergrowths in pyrometallurgical dust particles.

Jan 1, 1991

By Anna Franzkowiak, Dean Gregurek, Alfred Spanring, Angelika Ressler

In order to determine the most suitable refractory products and improve the lining lifetime for the diverse furnaces used in the nonferrous metal industry, corrosion tests are performed at RHI’s Technology Center. The practical facilities include the cup test, induction furnace, rotary kiln, and drip slag test described in this paper, which enable a comprehensive understanding of the chemo-thermal brick wear on a pilot scale. The corrosion trials are performed with actual slags generated during operations at a customer’s plant. To determine the highest influencing wear parameter, every single test is combined with a detailed mineralogical investigation and thermochemical calculations performed using FactSage. Based on the results, tailored refractory solutions for the nonferrous metal industry can be provided in combination with trials conducted at the customer’s site.

Jan 1, 2014

By Xi-Shan Li, Qian Li, Yong-bin Yang, Li-na Cui, Tao Jiang, Jie Ge

"With regard to control environment pollution in the roasting pretreatment of sulfur & arsenic-bearing gold concentrate, roasting of double-layered pellet was proposed. In the paper, the characteristics of double-layered pellet roasting were studied. Removal and solidification rates of sulfur and arsenic were investigated as primary factors. The result indicated that the removal and solidification rates of arsenic reached up to 95.91 % and 98.95% while the sulfur was 97.19% and 97.90% respectively on the premise of adopting slaked lime as solidified agent at temperature of 6000, the package proportion of 2.14 and roasting time of 3h. However, pyrite and arsenopyrite were transformed to hematite and magnetite and product of solidification mainly consisted of calcium sulfate, calcium arsenate and calcium sulfite within optimum roasting parameters.IntroductionUtilization of refractory gold resources has been gradually concentrated on with the depletion of the gold resources which are easy to deal with in the world [1]. Sulfur and arsenic-bearing gold ore is a typical refractory gold one, in which ultrafme gold is encapsulated in the structure of metal sulfide minerals [2,3], so it gives poor recovery through direct cyanide leaching. These refractory ores need pretreatment before the process of cyanide leaching to undermine lattice structure of pyrite and arsenopyrite containing gold [4] so that the gold could touch with cyanide solution [5]. Among various methods of pretreatment, conventional roasting method is most effective, but this process generates gases such as S02 and As203 harmful to environment. Therefore solidification roasting was proposed to solve this problem occurring in the conventional roasting at the end of last century."

Jan 1, 2013

By Chonghun Han, Tae-Hwa Choi, Young-Hwan Chu

"A statistical optimization method is proposed to maintain stable operation in a blast furnace with stave coolers. The objective of this study is to find the operating condition which maximizes productivity as well as minimizes the heat load on the stave coolers. In this method, we first analyzed historical data and calculated the heat flux of stave coolers and the burden distribution by mathematical models. In this approach, we determined the variables to optimize and manipulated variables to adjust these response variables. Next, we collected the necessary data for the data variables after preprocessing such as removal of noise and outlier. Finally, we constructed empirical models describing the patterns of response variables in terms of manipulated variables by partial least squares regression method, and then these models were used as objective functions for entire optimization problem. By using appropriate optimization algorithm, we determined the compromised optimum operating condition considering all response variables from the past operating conditions.IntroductionBlast furnace operation which is accompanied by complex physical and chemical phenomena is an essential process for steel industry. In this process, iron ore which is charged into the blast furnace from the top goes downward. It is reduced to iron by CO gas and is melted by the heat of combustion of coke and pulverized coal. The pig iron is tapped at the bottom in liquid phase after removing the slag, which floats on the pig iron.The cooling equipment of the blast furnace wall is changed from the plate type to the stave cooler recently. In order to cool the shell uniformly and eliminate shell spray cooling, Pohang No.2 blast furnace of POSCO (Pohang Iron & Steel Company) was equipped with 11 rows of stave coolers. These staves are only 350mm-thick including the 170 mm-deep refractory on the hot face."

Jan 1, 2001

By N. Coone

By exploiting the results of solidification modelling foundries can enhance the quality and reduce the cost of their casting processes. However not enough information exists on the thermal boundary conditions, which control the transfer of thermal energy stored in liquid metal to the mould via the metal/mould interface during solidification. This is quantified by the heat transfer coefficient (h.t.c.). An experimental and numerical study was carried out to find the magnitude and variation of the h.t.c. in cylindrical castings during the solidification of grey cast iron in green sand moulds. The h.t.c. values were calculated using a time marching solution to the inverse heat conduction problem. The variation of h.t.c. with metallostatic head was analysed. There is a wide scatter in green sand thermal properties due to the large number of variables involved in mould manufacture including green sand compaction and water content. The sensitivity of the calculation to uncertainties in the thermophysical properties of the green sand was evaluated. Keywords: Heat transfer coefficient, grey cast iron, sand moulds. inverse technique

Jan 1, 2003

By Sebastião Ribeiro, Leonardo Carneiro Sardinha, Alline Sardinha Cordeiro Morais, Carlos Maurício Fontes Vieira, Sergio Neves Monteiro

The glass tube of spent fluorescent lamps is contaminated with mercury, which might be a serious hazard in the case of conventional recycling by melting with other glasses. A possible solution could be its incorporation into a clay body to fabricate common fired ceramics such as bricks and tiles. The objective of this work is to characterize a type of fluorescent lamp glass waste to be incorporated into a clayey ceramic. The characterization was performed in terms of wettability tests to evaluate the interaction between the surface of the clayey ceramic and glass waste as a function of the firing temperature. The results showed that the contact angle decreased with increasing temperature, reaching a value of 79°, at a temperature of 1100°C, but not sufficient to completely wet the ceramic. However, compatible chemical composition and reduction of porosity by the flow of soft glass waste between the clay particles favor the consolidation of the ceramics structure above 900°C.

Jan 1, 2015

By Akira Yazawa

In the field of pyrometallurgy, the equilibrium evaluation has recently become easy by use of thermodynamic software, but it is strongly desired to estimate the amounts of non-equilibrium minor components to simulate practical processes. However, simple physico-chemical technique can not be applied to evaluate practical non-equilibrium components for many reasons. As an engineering solution for postulated equilibrium system, the activity coefficient is modified and introduced as the simulation parameter referred to as the "adjustment coefficient." This modified thermodynamic calculations were adopted to various sulfide roasting processes where many solid phases are participating and the system is not necessarily in equilibrium. Successful simulation was realized by assigning suitable adjustment coefficients for minor components which form a pseudo solid solution in the calcine. Some examples from sulfation roasting and dearsenizing roasting were discussed. In the smelting system, the loss of copper in slag is caused by equilibrium and non- equilibrium reasons, that is, chemical dissolution and entrainment of copper in slag. The total copper content of slag was simulated by use of the adjustment coefficient for entrained copper.

Jan 1, 1998

By Upali Siriwardane, Tushar V. Kudale, Naidu V. Seetala

"Cellulose acetate (CA) membranes with 25% triethyl citrate (TEC) as plasticizer were prepared with varying thickness for CO2 gas separation from water-gas-shift (WGS) reaction products. The AFM analysis of the CA membrane showed that the uniform coating had fewer and smaller pores as the film thickness increased, and corroborated by gas permeability studies. The CO2 permeability has decreased faster than CO permeability with the CA/TEC membrane thickness, and findings support that the CA membrane could be used to entrap CO2. Several CA/TEC membranes were also staked to increase the separation efficiency. Positron Annihilation Lifetime Spectroscopy (PALS) was used to estimate the nano-porosity (pore size and concentration) changes of CA/TEC films. PALS results show a decrease in pore size with increasing CA-TEC concentration in acetone, while the pore concentration increases. The PALS results are correlated with the CO2/CO permeability variations as the CA-TEC concentration change.IntroductionHydrogen is one of the main energy sources available for the future advancement of clean fuel technologies especially for fuel cells. Generation of hydrogen and CO2 from Water Gas Shift (WGS) reaction mixtures of CO and H2O is of interest to many researchers since it allows a large scale production of hydrogen [1, 2]. Once hydrogen is produced using the WGS reaction, the output products contain mixture of CO, CO2, H2, and water vapor. Metallic membranes have been used as hydrogen separation membranes [3-6]. As H2 is separated from the mixture using the metal membranes, we need to separate CO2, and find ways of sequestration of CO2 to avoid environmental problems by greenhouse gasses. Polymeric Membranes have been used for CO2 separation [7]. Plasticizer can control the micro-structural properties such as pore size and concentration of polymer membranes [8], which influence the size/molecular weight dependent diffusion rates of the gas molecules. We have used cellulose acetate with triethyl citrate as plasticizer to separate CO2 from the WGS reaction products. Positron annihilation lifetime spectroscopy (PALS) is very sensitive and able to identify different kinds of defects and their agglomerates such as vacancies, vacancy loops, and voids [9, 10]. PALS has been successful in determining the free volume in polymers that influence the properties of the polymers [11, 12]. Microscopic properties of the free volume obtained from PALS have been correlated to macroscopic properties [13, 14]. We used PALS to study the nanoporosity (pore size and concentration) and fractional free volume changes of CA/TEC films, and used to understand the variations observed in the CO2/CO permeability as the CA-TEC concentration in the membranes change."

Jan 1, 2014

By T. R. A. Davey

Previous publications on the application of EIETSIM include the modelling of an electrolytic zinc plant and a copper flash smelter. In the present case METSIM has been used to model the desilverising of lead by the reagent zinc, whereby a silver-zinc intermetallic compound is formed, and floats out of the lead. This compound has a variable composition, depending upon the ratio of dissolved zinc/silver in the lead bath. Its solubility in lead decreases with falling temperature. A number of variations and modifications of the Davey Desilverising Procedure are modelled, and applied to a wide range of silver contents in lead bullions at several plants. METSIM uses both feed- back and feed-forward controls to simulate plant conditions, and a logic control to distinguish between different phases in the Zn-Ag system. Use is made of extensive (previously unpublished) fundamental data on the ternary Pb-Ag-Zn system, and of plant data, to establish certain operating parameters.

Jan 1, 1993

By Huimin Lu, Qiang Li, Jingbo Xu

"The smelting reduction of V-Ti bearing beach placer by combined rotary hearth furnace and direct current arc furnace was studied in laboratory. It takes the aid of back propagation (BP) neural network theory to build the nonlinear mapping relations between the crucial process variables such as content of carbon, temperature and time and the degree of reduction. Then by the integrating BP neural network and genetic algorithm (GA), the optimized process parameters for the high degree of reduction were searched. The comparisons between experiment results and neural network simulation results show that GA-based on BP method can predict the degree of reduction with higher prediction accuracy. Calculations show that the integrated energy consumption of new technology is 580kgce/tHM, less than the current existing blast furnace.IntroductionThese V-Ti bearing beach placers (VTBBP) are secondary Fe-rich minerals formed by rivers, ocean waves, ocean tides and ocean currents on beach zones, their useful minerals are V-Ti magnetite ores. On Asia Pacific zone, such as Japan, China, Philippines, Indonesia, Australia and New Zealand, the VTBBP have large reserves and wide distribution. But so far, the VTBBP are not still comprehensively utilized. Therefore, in this paper, a combined rotary hearth furnace technology and arc furnace smelting method is studied for comprehensive utilization of the VTBBP. The main objective of this paper is to find optimum operation conditions for the production ofV-bearing iron and titania-rich slag from the VTBBP by means of the laboratory testing.Recently, neural network (NN) expected to be able to provide an effective tool because of its advantages, which describe nonlinear mapping relations. With the characteristics of strong selflearning, self-organization, robust error toleration and accurate nonlinear relation approximation, artificial neural network can be applied to nonlinear process modeling based on sufficient training. Back-propagation (BP) training algorithm is probably the frequently used one in practical application. Genetic algorithm has parallel search strategy and global optimization characteristics, which makes the trained neural network being higher classification accuracy and faster convergence speed. So it is necessary to combine neural network and genetic algorithm. The nonlinear relationship between input and output presented by NN and the global optimal function of GA are abroad applied in the engineering and scientific research [1, 2]. So these methods supply an efficient path to solve the above problems. At present, it is common to study the optimization of process parameters by orthogonal experimental design, the method combining neural network and genetic algorithm is a novel and better method than orthogonal experimental design. Tills study organized the above advantages to optimize the process parameters for comprehensive utilization of the VTBBP."

Jan 1, 2012

By Deyou Yin, Kongfang Feng, Bo Wang, Jieyu Zhang, Xin Hong, Shaobo Zheng, Jinyin Xie

"The flow patterns and mixing characteristics in a water model of C-H2 smelting reduction furnace are experimentally studied in this paper. Water modeling is employed to investigate the features of gas jet stirring and the fluid flow patterns in the bath of a smelting reduction furnace during the top, bottom, and side combined blowing process. The influence of the gas flow rate for top, bottom and side nozzles, angle, submerged depth of each side nozzles and the height of the top nozzle has been examined. It showed that the gas flow rate of side nozzles and bottom nozzle had a key role on the fluid flow and mixing characteristics. The gas jet from the top nozzle could change the agitation and fluid flow pattern caused by the gas jets from the side nozzles in the bath.IntroductionFacing the current natural resources decrease and the environmental degradation, smelting reduction iron-making technique is believed to be the most representative at present. Mid last century, the concept of producing liquid iron or semi-steel directly from ore fines and inexpensive fuel was the subject of considerable pilot plant development activity. Among these projects, the direct smelting process, which is the reduction and melting of iron-bearing materials by carbon and other hydrocarbons in the vessel containing a molten bath, is the most popular one. A number of direct smelting processes have been developed around the world, e.g. COREX, DIOS, HIsmelt, AISI, ROMELT, etc.These studies put forward a new technology, which through bottom nozzle blowing rich hydrogen, top nozzle blowing rich oxygen and provide preheating ore and solvent, side nozzles blowing oxygen-coal to realize smelting reduction iron-making process. Owing to the metallurgy reactions always in high temperature, which is above 1600 °C, it is difficult to visualize the mixing behavior and measure the desired phenomena in the reduction vessel. With water modeling, the primary advantages are that it is relatively easy to observe and measure the flow phenomena in the bath."

Jan 1, 2011