Evaluation of processing options for the treatment of zinc sulphide concentrates at Skorpion zinc

• Main Author: Fuls, Herman Franz
• Format: Dissertation
• Language: English
• Published: University of Cape Town 2014
• Subjects: Bioprocess Engineering
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/11427/10497

Includes bibliographical references (p.84-87). === The zinc oxide resource of Skorpion Zinc, an integrated zinc mine and refinery, near Rosh Pinah in southern Namibia, will be depleted by end of 2015 with a possible extension to 2017. Extensive exploration drilling was unsuccessful. With the abundant availability of zinc sulphide concentrates regionally the life of the operation may be extended by processing these concentrates. The leach kinetics of zinc sulphides is vastly slower than oxides, preventing the processing of zinc sulphides using the existing process, under current conditions. The challenge is to identify a suitable zinc sulphide treatment process that can be integrated with the existing plant. Information from the bench scale test work and an update of the economic models will provide sufficient accuracy for Skorpion to select either the pressure or the atmospheric leach process.