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CFD Study on Improvement of Non-uniform Stirring in a Large Bottom-Blown Copper Smelting Furnace

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Abstract

The bottom-blown smelting technology has been widely adopted in non-ferrous metal smelting industries. The largest bottom-blown smelting furnace used in copper smelting was numerically simulated to improve the stirring effect in the molten bath by optimizing the oxygen injector arrangement and blowing parameters. The results show that a small injector spacing leads to gas jet coalescence, which is detrimental for smelting efficiency, increases copper loss and shortens furnace service life. Three schemes were proposed to improve the uneven stirring and reduce the gas jet coalescence by increasing the axial spacing of the injectors, the radial installation angle and the gas injection angle. Changing the axial spacing of the injectors can significantly reduce the gas jet coalescence, yielding the best stirring effect. The results of simulation suggested that when the axial spacing of the injectors was increased from 0.380 m to 0.610 m, the mean melt velocity in the mixing zone increased to 0.243 m/s, which was 20.9% higher than that before the optimization. Meanwhile the \(\varvec{RSD}\) (relative standard spatial deviation of melt velocity) decreased from 123% to 84%. In the actual production, the matte content in the smelting slag decreased from 6.57% to 3.12% after changing the axial spacing of the injectors from 0.380 m to 0.610 m.

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Data Availability

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, upon reasonable request.

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Funding

The authors received financial support for this research work from the National Key Research and Development Program of China (2022YFB3304901) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 51974018).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Green and Low-carbon Metallurgy, University of Science and Technology Beijing, Beijing, 100083, China

    Wei Wang, Hongliang Zhao, Xiaoyi Cai & Fengqin Liu

  2. School of Metallurgical and Ecological Engineering, University of Science and Technology Beijing, Beijing, 100083, China

    Wei Wang, Liangzhao Mu, Hongliang Zhao, Xiaoyi Cai & Fengqin Liu

  3. Department of Materials Science and Engineering, The University of Utah, Salt Lake City, 84112, UT, USA

    Hong Yong Sohn

  4. BGRIMM Technology Group, Beijing, 100160, China

    Liangzhao Mu

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  1. Wei Wang
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Correspondence to Hongliang Zhao.

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Wang, W., Mu, L., Zhao, H. et al. CFD Study on Improvement of Non-uniform Stirring in a Large Bottom-Blown Copper Smelting Furnace. Mining, Metallurgy & Exploration (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42461-024-00968-6

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