Effect of typical impurities for the formation of floating slimes in copper electrorefining

Shila Jafari*, Mikko Kiviluoma, Taina Kalliomäki, Elisabeth Klindtworth, Arif Tirto Aji, Jari Aromaa, Benjamin P. Wilson, Mari Lundström

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleScientificpeer-review

29 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

In electrorefining, Group 15 impurities arsenic, antimony and bismuth, may precipitate within the bulk electrolyte as floating slimes and contaminate the copper cathodes. In order to determine the impurity specific thresholds related to the formation of suspended solids, synthetic copper electrorefining electrolytes with different concentrations of arsenic, antimony and bismuth were investigated by a continuous filtration method. The amount and composition of the floating slimes obtained were evaluated in terms of the initial impurity concentrations present in the synthetic electrolyte. As a result, the specific influence of arsenic, antimony and bismuth on the floating slime formation was ascertained. The results suggest that there is an upper limit in electrorefining electrolytes for antimony (Sb) of 800 mg/L for floating slime formation, although the limit for Bi was less clear. Furthermore, the structure of the synthetic floating precipitates produced were analyzed using both SEM-EDS and XRD and showed typical amorphous structure of floating slimes with particle size of approximately 25 μm and predicted composition of BiAsO4, SbAsO4, Sb2O3and Bi2O3.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)109-115
JournalInternational Journal of Mineral Processing
Volume168
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 10 Nov 2017
MoE publication typeA1 Journal article-refereed

Funding

This research has been performed within the SIMP (System Integrated Metal Production) project of DIMECC (Digital, Internet, Materials and Engineering Co-Creation, Tampere, Finland). The RawMatTERS Finland Infrastructure (RAMI) based in Aalto University and supported by Academy of Finland is greatly acknowledged. In addition, The manuscript is partly supported by CMEco project funded by TEKES foundation to publish as open access article.

Keywords

  • Antimony
  • Arsenic
  • Bismuth
  • Copper
  • Electrorefining
  • Floating slime

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