Other

Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation

Glencore Technology Pty Limited

Xstrata Queensland Limited

Mim Holdings Limited

Glencore Queensland Limited

Australian Magnesium Corporation Pty Ltd.

Highlands Frieda Pty. Limited

Michael Matthew Hourn

John Anthony Willis

David Winborne

Paul Benjamin Voigt

Fook-Sin Wong

David Hughes Jenkins

Duncan Turner

Rodrigo U Ventura

Manabu Kodama

Gregory John Sheehan

Ian Raymond Holzberger

Daniel Mallah

Duncan William Turner

Patrick Bowen

Rodrigo Ulep Ventura

Patrick Joseph Bowen

A method for treating a mineral composition containing iron, arsenic or other Group VA compounds comprises milling the mineral composition to a particle size of Pof less than 25 &#x3bc;m and leaching the mineral composition in the presence of lime and/or limestone and a soluble alkali complexing agent and in the presence of an oxygen containing gas at a pH in the range of from 3.5 to 6.

Leaching of minerals

A process for treating a mixed sulphidic material containing lead sulphide and at least one other metal sulphide. The process includes the steps of subjecting the mixed sulphidic material to selective oxidation such that lead sulphide in the material is oxidised to form an oxidized lead compound while substantial oxidation of the at least one other metal sulphide is avoided, and separating the oxidized lead compound from the at least one other metal sulphide. The oxidized lead compound may be separated by flotation wherein the oxidized lead compound reports to the tailings and the at least one other metal sulphide reports to the concentrate (froth).

Treatment of sulphidic materials

Precious metals such as gold can be extracted from a refractory ore using a conventional cyanide leaching step and with reduced cyanide consumption by pre-treating the ore prior to cyanide leaching. The refractory ore is pretreated by fine grinding and an initial leaching step which uses inexpensive limestone and lime to maintain the initial leach relatively alkaline. Oxygen is added to the initial leaching step and the conditions are carefully controlled to only partially oxidize the ground ore to between 9-15%. The initial leaching step can be carried out at temperatures of less than 100 degrees C. and at atmospheric pressures. The pre-treated ore is then leached by a conventional cyanide leaching step to recover the precious metal and cyanide consumption can be reduced by more than two thirds.

Reducing cyanide consumption in gold recovery from finely ground sulphide ores and concentrates

A method of processing a mineral composition comprising a refractory material the method comprising milling the composition to a particle size of P of less than 25 microns and leaching said composition with a solution comprising lime and/or limestone in the presence of an oxygen containing gas.

Method for treating precious metal bearing minerals

Anhydrous magnesium chloride is prepared by a process in which hydrated magnesium chloride (10) is mixed in a vessel (11) with ethylene glycol (12). The mixture (13) is dehydrated in distillation columns (14, 15 and 16) with the dehydrated ethylene glycol magnesium chloride solution (20) pumped into a crystalliser (21) simultaneously with the separate addition of anhydrous ammonia gas (22) to the crystalliser (21). Prior to the introduction of reactants (20 and 22), the crystalliser (21) contains ethylene glycol saturated with ammonia. A crystalliser slurry of magnesium chloride hexammoniate (23) is continuously pumped from the crystalliser (21) into a pressure filter (24) where the crystals are washed with methanol saturated with ammonia (26). The washed crystals (27) are transferred to a fluidised bed calciner (28) where methanol is evaporated from the crystals at 120.degree. C. and thereafter the crystals are calcined to anhydrous magnesium chloride at 450.degree. C.

Anhydrous magnesium chloride

Atmospheric mineral leaching process

Growing community of inventors

Carindale, Australia

Michael Matthew Hourn