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High-temperature chlorination of gold with transformation of iron phase

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Abstract

Gold in cyanide tailings from Shandong Province is mainly encapsulated by hematite and magnetite at distribution rates of 76.49 % and 10.88 %, respectively. Chlorination–reduction one-step roasting of cyanide tailings was conducted under the following conditions: calcium chloride dosage of 6 %, bituminous coal dosage of 30 %, calcium oxide dosage of 10 % (all dosages are vs. the mass of cyanide tailings) at 1000 °C of roasting temperature. X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and chemical-phase analysis were performed to investigate the effects of iron phase transformation on the high-temperature chlorination of gold. Results indicate that the lattice structure of hematite undergoes expansion, pulverization, and reorganization when hematite is reduced to magnetite, which leads to 42.03 % gold exposure, and the high-temperature chlorination rate of gold is 41.17 % at the same time. The structure of wustite formed by the reduction in magnetite is porous and loose, and thus 44.02 % of gold is exposed. The high-temperature chlorination rate of gold is increased by 41.98 percentage points. When wustite is reduced to metallic iron, 4.42 % of gold is exposed, and the high-temperature chlorination rate of gold is increased by 3.38 percentage points. Accordingly, the high-temperature chlorination of gold mainly occurs in two stages, in which Fe2O3 is reduced to Fe3O4, and Fe3O4 is reduced to Fe x O finally.

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Acknowledgments

This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 51474018).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Science and Technology Beijing, Beijing, 100083, China

    Zheng-Yao Li, Wei-Wei Wang, Kun Yue & Ming-Xing Chen

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  1. Zheng-Yao Li
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  2. Wei-Wei Wang
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  3. Kun Yue
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  4. Ming-Xing Chen
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Correspondence to Zheng-Yao Li.

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Li, ZY., Wang, WW., Yue, K. et al. High-temperature chlorination of gold with transformation of iron phase. Rare Met. 35, 881–886 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12598-016-0804-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12598-016-0804-6

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