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By Eric Klaffenbach

Valorization of slag from metallurgical industrial processes becomes ever more important as this may help optimizing and reducing the use of natural resources such as rock and sand. In view of this objective, metallurgical processes have to be analyzed in order to modify the slag composition so that it will meet the expected requirements of potential users of these resources. This paper gives the results of a thermodynamic analysis of the flash smelting process to understand the impact of operational parameters on slag chemistry and elemental partitioning in the process. It is shown that an increase of the matte grade and temperature leads to higher deportment of Pb, Zn and As to the slag. With increasing matte grade the volatilization of these elements decreases. Furthermore, the results indicate an increasing solubility of Cu and S in slag at higher temperatures.

By Sridhar Seetharuman

Sulfur and oxygen dissolved in nickel and cupronickel melts can be removed as gaseous oxides of sulfur by a vacuum treatment. Presented in this paper is a new matched thermochemical diagram that permits direct evaluation of the equilibrium partial pressure of SO, as a function of temperature over an alloy of specified composition. The matched thermochemical diagram consists of a central plot which shows the integral Gibbs' energy of mixing for the binary system S-O2, at different temperatures. The central plot is flanked on either side by terminal plots of the chemical potentials of oxygen and sulfur, as functions of temperature, for different alloy compositions. By projecting the chemical potentials of oxygen and sulfur from the terminal plots on to the central diagram, the equilibrium pressure of SO2,can be directly read on the nomograms on the central plot at different temperatures. The matched thermochemical diaerams are - useful in assuring the efficiency of vacuum refining.

Jan 1, 1993

By Hongbo Yang, Tongbo Zhang, Ting Huang, Jingshe Li, Fangfang Song

"Liquid core length is a very important parameter of the process of continuous casting, which directly reflects the cooling status in secondary cooling zone and solidification rate of the slab. In this paper, the billet caster in some steel plant in China was chosen as the prototype of simulating. A numerical simulating model for calculating the liquid core length of continuous casting billet was built by ProCAST software, which was verified reasonable and accurate by pin-shooting technique. Based on the model, the relationships between casting speed, casting temperature and liquid core length of casting billet were found, which was very practically useful for the workers on sit to improve casting billet quality. IntroductionContinuous casting process developed very rapidly because of the high metal yield, energy saving, and low-cost 111• And the quality requirements of continuous casting billet for customers became higher and higher with the fast development of economic121• Internal defect usually is the major quality problem for continuous casting billet[3•61 , which is influenced by the solidification process of casting billet, especially the solidification process of liquid core17•81 • So it is very important to study on the relationship between casting parameters and the liquid core length which means the distance between the crystallizer meniscus and the casting billet solidification end-point. In practical production process, the workers usually control the quality of casting billet according to the liquid core length."

Jan 1, 2013

By Wei Gao, Qing-cai Liu, Cun-fang Lu, Jian Yang, Hinmi Zheng

"The mode of occurrence of sulfur and mercury in 57 Chinese bituminous coals have been examined using X-ray fluorescence spectrometry (XRF), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and Zeeman atomic absorption mercury spectrometer. Mercury levels in coal are related to the geographic location of the coals and types of the coals. A synthesis of result indicated that most likely occurrence modes of mercury in high-sulfur and high-mercury coals are in solid solution in pyrite. Our study from 57 coal samples showed that most values of mercury concentration in coal varied from 100 to 1000 ng/g with an average of approximately 500ng/g, and mathematical model about correlation between mercury and sulfur was gained by mathematical statistics. This is apparent that mercury and sulfur vary concomitantly from coal data (table 3) , the high correlation between them in all coals at confidence of 95% ( a=0.05 ) .1. INTRODUCTIONThere contained about one trillion ton abundant coal resources in China. As a leading level of proven coal reserves in the world, the coals mainly distributed in north China and northwest China, especially in Shanxi, Guizhou, Shanxi provinces and Inner-Mongolia autonomous region. At the same time, China has the largest production and consumption of coal, and has the output of coal nearly accounted for 37 percent of the world's production. Coal-fired power plants are the major source of energy generation in China, and the proportion of coal combustion is up to 75 percent in the total energy configuration. Therefore, the mercury pollution caused by coal-fired has become a topic of wide-spread discussions since 1990. The contamination of mercury of human activities accounted for 10 to 30 percent [1], and the mercury emissions of coal-fired flue gas has made the greatest contribution to the pollution of atmosphere[2] In the past 30 years, the global increasing concentration of mercury pollutant in atmosphere maybe result from coal combustion[2]. The mercury emissions caused by coal-burning has become the main reason of China's mercury pollution, and the characteristics of mercury pollution is closely related to China's energy configuration, additionally, the features of mercury pollution have changed from the point pollution in 1970's to diffused pollution today[3]. Mercury can be found in various types of coals, and it is evaporated into gas phase during the combustion process."

Jan 1, 2011

By Adrien Antenen, Didier Villette

CITRON has developed a new process for the recycling of hydroxide sludge, household batteries, catalysts, automobile shredding residues, grinding sludge and other metal containing organic and inorganic waste. A pilot plant with a capacity of 1,000 tons per year has started operations in April 1998. In August 1999, an industrial plant became operational with an initial treatment capacity of 23,000 tons.

Jan 1, 2000

By Dong Liang, Qijie Zhai, Zhichen Zhang, Qixin Li, Zhishuai Xu

"The formation, distribution and survival of pure Al nuclei under surface pulsed magneto oscillation (SPMO) treatment were investigated with thecombination of experiments and numerical simulation. The results indicated that the nuclei originated from the whole top surface of melt owing to the oscillation of top surface induced by SPMO. The temperature field significantly affected the survival of the nuclei The electromagnetic force and flow field of the melt with SPMO treatment were simulated by finite element software ANSYS. The electromagnetic force mainly distributed below the top surface near the mould wall. The electromagnetic farce not only made the melt oscillate but also increased the convection of meh below the top surface vigorously. The oscillation near the top surface of the melt promoted the nucleation largely, and the convection increased the uniform of the temperature distribution in the whole meh which favored the survival of nucleiIntroductionAs we all know, fine equiaxed grains are beneficial fur the improvement of the mechanical property, process ability and the uniformity of metallic materials [1-2]. With the researches of recent decades, people discovered that the electromagnetic field is an efficient method to refine the solidified structure of metals [3-7]. Pulsed magnetic field technology obtains more and more attentions in recent years due to its smaller power consumption, bigger instantaneous magnetic field intensity, non-contacting with the meh and simple convenient equipment manufacturing [8-9]. However, the melts would splash fiercely when pulsed magnetic field is applied with a slightly higher power. Thus, based on the understanding of the solidification refinement mechanism of electric current pulse (ECP) [10], Gong et al [11] developed a novel technology called pulse magneto-oscillation (PMO) to refine the solidification structure. The technology can be easily applied in the solidification structure refinement of continuous casting slab. But fur aluminum continuous casting, the sump is very shallow, which greatly limits the application of pulse magneto-oscillation technology."

Jan 1, 2014

By Simon N. Lekakh, D. G. C. Robertson

A new integrated CFD-combined reactors approach is proposed for the description of processes in metallurgical vessels. CFD simulations were used to obtain the melt flow pattern in the vessels (ladle, tundish, and continuous caster mold). From these simulations, the characteristic curves were derived: (i) the residence time distribution curves (RTD) for flow-through systems (at tundish exit or at dendrite coherency surface in the mold) and (ii) the mixing curves for closed systems (ladle). In the next step, the melt flow was represented in a “combined reactors” system consisting of a combination of unit reactors (Plug Flow, Mixer, and Recirculated Volume). An inverse simulation was used to define the volumes of the reactor units and the melt flow rates between them by fitting to the characteristic curves from both methods (CFD and combined reactors). The suggested approach is demonstrated for multiple designs of Ar-stirred ladles, tundish, and SEN. This methodology can be used to enhance traditional post-processing CFD analysis and also as a tool for on-line process control.

Jan 1, 2014

By Luben Xie, Lin Hu, Qiang Wang, Min Gan, Tao Jiang, Wenqi Li, Yi Wang, Xiaohui Fan

"The mineralization behaviors of typical fluxes are studied by investigating the microstructures with optical microscope. The results show that the reactions begin with between iron ore and lime, limestone with small particle to form primary liquid. Then coarse limestone, dolomite and serpentine take part in reaction under the action of primary liquid. Limestone is the easiest to mineralization, next dolomite, and the last is serpentine. The higher basicity and smaller fluxes size favor the mineralization process of dolomite and serpentine.IntroductionThe purposes of adding fluxes into sintering are that:(1) to increase the basicity of sinter, so as to reduce even eliminate addition fluxes into BF(blast furnace) and decrease the coke ratio of BF[1,2]. (2) to decrease the melting point of sintering mixture to ensure sintering can be carried out at a lower temperature and reduce the energy consumption. (3) to improve the qualities of sinter by forming binding phase with iron ore fines [3].Flux is another significant component for sinter besides iron ore, especially for high basicity sinter[4]. The proportion of flux is usually higher than 10% in sinter mixture(excluding return mine).There were many reports about the influence of the flux types on sintering, such as limestone, dolomite, lime and so on[5-7]. It is very important to choose suitable fluxes for iron ore sintering. Although the effect of flux size on sintering also has been researched, the mineralization behaviors of the fluxes in the sintering process has not been illuminated. The paper will study the mineralization behavior of fluxes in sintering."

Jan 1, 2011

By Zengjie Wang

Investigation on hydrochloric acid leaching of the ilmenite from Panzhihua, China was carried out to prepare synthetic rutile. The leaching parameters were optimized to obtain high content of TiO2 in the products. The experimental data suggest that an optimum leaching can be realized with 30% acid, a solid/liquid ratio of 1/4 at 95°C for 4h, and ore ground for -400 mesh size. After the acid leaching, an additional alkaline leaching process using hot NaOH solution was performed, and then the products was in grain form followed by heat treated at 900°C for 2h in order to extract Si and increase the particle size of synthetic rutile. The final product has a high content of TiO2 (about 95%), a low content of chlorine consuming elements (total CaO+MgO =0.07%) and a suitable particle size distribution for chlorination process.

Jan 1, 2008

By Hans Jürgen Maier, Hans-Bernward Besserer, Gregory Gerstein, Florian Nürnberger

The formation and development of voids in both the single-phase ferritic steel DC04 and the dual-phase ferritic-martensitic steel DP600 are discussed. Various mechanisms and kinetics of void formation are considered regarding the influence of dislocation glide, precipitates and other parameters. Different characteristic locations in the microstructure are investigated at which strain concentrations during plastic deformation can occur and cause the formation of voids and microcracks. For the specimen preparation ion slope cutting is applied. Voids and cracks revealing ductile damage are analyzed by Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM). Stress concentrations in consequence of plastic deformation could be shown by extinction contours on images recorded by Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM).

Jan 1, 2015

By QIE Jun-mao, DONG Fang, DENG Hao-hua

The DIL402C thermal dilatometer and STA449C thermal analyzer were employed to test the linear expansion and contraction coefficient，CP and DSC curve of 304 stainless steel. The result showed that the linear expansion coefficient range was 20.9700×10-6～21.5712×10-6 and the linear contraction coefficient range was 21.2528×10-6～21.9471×10-6.The linear expansion and contraction coefficient were higher than other steel grade，so the 304 stainless steel belonged to the crack sensitive steel. Because of the crystal phase transformation occurred during the 1000~1400 ℃,the curve of CP fluctuated obviously and the defects of casting blank occurred easily. Chosen 1414℃ as the liquidus temperature of 304 stainless steel based on the analysis results of DSC. The curve of DSC was unsmooth during 1450～1100℃，the crystal phase transformation occurs and thermal stability of slab was inferior.When the initial solidified shell formed in this temperature range,the thickness of the shell would be nonuniform and the surface defects occurred more easily.

Jan 1, 2015

By Samson Adeosun, Sanmbo Balogun, David Esezobor

"Iron and steel making processes give rise to large amounts of usable and unusable materials, the latter generally being termed wastes. It is sometimes difficult to distinguish between re-usable by-products and wastes which cannot be sold or land-filled. Much depends on circumstances such as the local market for the material. This can itself vary from time to time with by-products which cannot be used or sold becoming wastes and vice versa. This paper defines the concept of “waste-free technology”, discusses its development in the steel industry and highlights the benefits of the technology to the manufacturing sector and the environment. The paper also articulates how the “waste-free” technology could be applied in the proposed Ajaokuta integrated steel plant in Nigeria.IntroductionIn the past, nature was considered an inexhaustible store. Its resources were consequently exploited and waste products therefrom were discarded. Today, attitudes have not changed appreciably even as raw materials cost rise by the year to pose a series of socio-economic problems, which, among others, may include the rational and optimum utilization of resources, environmental protection and reduction of waste formation. Consequently, industrialists now face unexpected regulatory pressure in areas of pollution prevention, waste minimization and hazardous waste disposal.Iron and steel making processes give rise to significant amounts of usable and un-usable materials, the latter generally being termed waste. It is sometimes difficult to distinguish between re-usable by-products and wastes which cannot be sold or land-filled. Much depends on circumstances such as the local market for the material. This can itself vary from time to time with by-products which cannot be used or sold becoming wastes and vice versa. In this paper, the term waste refers to those materials that are either irrationally utilized or, land-filled and part of the byproducts that are not utilized. It includes that part of used materials which is not incorporated into the products manufactured during a process stage and which in contrast to reuseable materials, is considered not suitable for any further use, owing to technical or economic factors. In general, these materials are inorganic and parts of them are either utilized or passed to the other processes; the other part should be disposed of using well-established waste disposal practices to avoid any environmental threat.Thus, creative methods must be developed to modify the manufacturing processes to reduce emissions and process wastes by fully utilizing all resources. One method of eliminating the negative effect of waste formation is the use of purification and cleaning structures (pollution control system, PCS). These are, however, quite expensive."

Jan 1, 2008

By Hiromichi Ohla

Precise thermal properties of molten materials are essentially required for analyzing the metal production process. These properties are also important as a clue to consider the dynamic structure of liquid materials. However, it is difficult to obtain the precise thermal diffusivity values of molten oxides at high temperature because of the experimental uncertainties arising from the bubble formation or the severe separation of radiative and conductive heat components. Recently a novel laser flash method has also developed for measuring thernnal diffusivity of molten oxides at high temperature. In this new technique, the sample is melted in a metal crucible and heated to the desired temperature. A single laser pulse is flashed on the bottom of the metal crucible and the infrared ray irradiated from the same bottom surface is measured for obtaining the temperature decay, from which the thennal diffusivity of the liquid sample can be estimated. The usefulness and validity of this new laser flash technique have been confirmed by obtaining the thermal diffusivity values of silicate melts in the wide temperature range between 773 and 1673 K.

Jan 1, 2003

By Hiromichi Ohta

Precise thermal properties of molten materials are essentially required for analyzing the metal production process. These properties are also important as a clue to consider the dynamic structure of liquid materials. However, it is difficult to obtain the precise thermal diffusivity values of molten oxides at high temperature because of the experimental uncertainties arising from the bubble formation or the severe separation of radiative and conductive heat components. Recently a novel laser flash method has also developed for measuring thermal diffusivity of molten oxides at high temperature. In this new technique, the sample is melted in a metal crucible and heated to the desired temperature. A single laser pulse is flashed on the bottom of the metal crucible and the infrared ray irradiated from the same bottom surface is measured for obtaining the temperature decay, from which the thermal diffusivity of the liquid sample can be estimated. The usefulness and validity of this new laser flash technique have been confirmed by obtaining the thermal diffusivity values of silicate melts in the wide temperature range between 773 and 1673 K.

Jan 1, 2003

By K. Sarveswara Rao

"Any innovative approach made in non-ferrous metallurgical industry centers upon developing new processes, saving materials, improving production quality, and bornagain materials. Aqueous processing is commonly used to treat lean grade or more complex ore bodies. Its sustenance largely depends on energy and environmental compliance including water and wastewater management. The present paper focuses the importance of using particle size distribution and surface area measurements during ammoniacal dissolution of a Cu-Pb-Zn sulphide bulk concentrate and with an overview of the effect of water salinity on the process chemistry and residue mineralogy. Accordingly, an effort is made here to discuss the emerging perspective and highlight the recent successes and trends in terms of energy savings in non-ferrous hydrometallurgy.IntroductionThe nature and structure of the global energy industry is likely to change significantly in the 21st Century. Rabago et al [1] have comprehensively discussed how the mining and minerals industries can adapt to the challenges and opportunities posed by trends and drivers in global energy use. According to the authors, the drivers of sustainability include water, efficient energy use, climate modification, transportation technologies and energy security. Sustainability and competitiveness for the minerals industry will depend on natural capitalism, resource efficiency, new processes, saving materials, improving production quality, born-again materials and the solutions economy. Based on this motivation, the theme of the present paper is centered upon applications as relevant to energy and sustainable development in non-ferrous hydrometallurgy."

Jan 1, 2009

By Musa Karakus

Reflected light microscopic (RLM) examination of dust particles from lead and copper smelters can effectively characterize their mineralogy, texture, and origin. Scanning electron microscopic-energy dispersive spectroscopic (SEM-EDS) analysis provides confirmation of the optical identifications and chemical data on the phases. Studied lead smelter dust samples were from the: I) blast furnace, 2) sinter plant scrubber, 3) sinter plant crusher, 4) dross furnace, and 5) refinery. Phases identified included galena fragments, melted PbS, metallic Pb and Cu, Cu-Ni, Cu-Zn, Zn-Ag, Zn-Cu-Ag, Ni-Cu-Sb, and Ni-Cu-Zn-Ag metal alloys, Ni-sulfide, Cu-sulfide, and Cu-Pb-sulfide dross .phases; slag and sinter particles, coke fragments, unreacted original feed phases: pyrite, chalcopyrite, sphalerite, siegenite, bravoite; and oxidized particles: iss, bornite, chalcocite, covellite, magnetite, hematite, and goethite. Dust from a secondary copper refinery were found by RLM and SEM to consist of tenorite, cuprite, cassiterite, two silicate phases. Magnetite, hematite, Fe-Al-Cr-Mg spinel, periclase, forsterite, and wollastonite were derived from the furnace linings during initial cleaning.

Jan 1, 1992

By Takuya Shinagawa

After vitrification of the residues from a municipal solid waste incinerator, the vitrified products can be used as a construction material, and the dust can be used as raw materials for the non- ferrous industry. The NKK electric-resistance furnace is operated under a reducing atmosphere, and heavy metals such as zinc and lead in the ash vaporize to form dust. Also, dust from the NKK electric-resistance ash melting furnace is composed of water insoluble zinc and lead components and water soluble NaCl and KCI. This is why, The concentration of zinc and lead in the dust after washing is sufficiently high for the dust to be used as a raw material for the zinc and lead industry. NKK developed a heavy metal recovery process in which zinc and lead in the dust are reclaimed as a raw material for smelting by making the best use of the characteristics of the dust.

Jan 1, 2002

By F. E. Brinckman, G. J. Olson, D. Johnsonbaugh, T. K. Trout

"Microbiological metal recovery is an emerging technology likely to play an increasing role in commercial ore leaching, metal removal from process and waste streams, and perhaps ultimately in processing to yield metal products in specified forms or oxidation states. We are studying the potential for using microorganisms for the recovery of elements important to emerging materials technologies and for which domestic supplies are limited and/or low grade. Examples to be discussed include the bioaccumulation of yttrium and gallium. These elements are important in the production of new superconductor and semiconductor materials. However, limited domestic reserves and technologies for their recovery may cause supply problems. Microbiological processes may offer new techniques for recovery of these and other strategic elements.IntroductionMicroorganisms in ore leachingMicroorganisms assist in the commercial leaching of copper and uranium from low grade ores (1,2) and recently have been shown to have immediate commercial potential for the pretreatment of refractory gold ores to increase the gold-cyanide recovery yield (3). Copper bioleaching is the best known example of biotechnology applied to metal recovery. Copper can be recovered by commercial leaching of huge piles or dumps of low grade sulfidic ores and waste materials, which are not otherwise processable. Microbial activity in the leach dump environment oxidizes metal sulfides to soluble metal sulfates:"

Jan 1, 1988

By Clemens Schmetterer, Patrick J. Masset

"The surface tension represents an important property for the modelling of high temperature processes. In this study the surface tension of two Al2O3 – CaO – SiO2 model slags and the influence of the admixture of 5 up to 30 wt.% FeO were studied. The surface tension measurements were carried out using the sessile drop technique on BN substrates under Ar atmosphere (10-6 atm O2) up to 1500 °C.IntroductionThe aim of VIRTUHCON1 is the virtualization of high temperature conversion processes, a task that requires thorough understanding of these processes. In many of these conversion processes slag plays an important role to control the properties of the product, to protect the reactor lining or simply as waste. Slag surface tension is one of the materials properties that is needed for the description of such processes, since it influences the interactions between the components in the reactor, e.g. at the slag – Fe interface in the blast furnace.Surface and interfacial tensions have thus received considerable attention in research, but the number of investigations in this particular pseudo-quaternary system is surprisingly low. Furthermore, the literature data are subject to different measurement conditions and techniques which complicates the data analysis and comparison.The slag atlas [1] offers a compilation of the available literature until 1986 (shown in Table I), but literature search has not revealed more recent studies of this system until now. For example, Elliott and Mounier [2] determined the surface tension of ACSF slags using the double tube maximum bubble pressure technique at 1200 °C. They kept their slags in contact with Cu-S-F mattes, and the slag therefore contained a certain amount of sulphur which acts as a surfactant and lowers the surface tension. The compositions of their slags were scattered over a wide composition range and they did not use a common ACS base mixture for their tests, either. The surface tension values vary between 417 and 446 mN/m, but due to the reasons just mentioned no trend in the measurements can be observed and the influence of FeO admixture on the surface tension cannot be deduced. Further information including the temperature dependence is available from Pavlov et al. [3], Ishchanov and Shushkov [4] and Murav’eva and Kaplun [5]; the diagram on page 446 in Ref. [1] has been drawn from these sources. Both positive and negative temperature coefficients are reported in these works. SiO2 is the only pure constituent that has a positive temperature coefficient [6], but a correlation of the temperature coefficient with the SiO2 content was not found to be conclusive."

Jan 1, 2011

By Norihiko Fukatsu

In order to use effectively the previously reported new sensing system for hydrogen and oxygen potentials in molten copper, the criteria of the potentials for getting sound castings have been determined in the laboratory experiment. The copper melt equilibrated with a given hydrogen and an oxygen potential was rapidly quenched in the crucible. The relations between the holding potentials and the gas porosity in the solidified sample were investigated by measuring the density of the sample and microscopic observations. It was found that the defects of the gas porosity became the maximum at the potentials where the dissolved amount of hydrogen and oxygen was in the mole ratio 2: I. The samples having the density more than 99% of the theoretical value were obtained in the higher oxygen and lower hydrogen potential region or in the lower oxygen and higher hydrogen potential region. The criteria thus determined were examined by comparing with the measured potentials in the practical easting machine. In tough-pitch copper casting, the problem due to gas porosity was found to be serious when the hydrogen potential increased. In the oxygen-free copper casting, the evolution of hydrogen was found not avoided. The gas porosity in the casting, however, was found eliminated when the oxygen potential was kept at a low value.

Jan 1, 2003