Expanding the cobalt recovery circuit at the Thompson nickel refinery

Abstract

The cobalt recovery circuit at the Inco Thompson nickel refinery needed to be expanded to allow the treatment of concentrate from the recently commissioned Voisey's Bay project. Due to higher cobalt grades than historically processed, the capacity of the cobalt circuit needed to be increased from 400 tonnes to 1,000 tonnes of cobalt peryear. This paper describes the process used at Thompson and the philosophy employed to determine what additional equipment was needed to de-bottleneck the plant, allowing the additional throughput.