Possibilities for the Environmental Processing of Gold-Bearing Ores

This article will focus on the alkaline leaching of gold-bearing tetrahedrite concentrate in a solution containing sodium sulfide and sodium hydroxide. This selective leaching is followed by the leaching of heavy and waste metals into the solution, which may influence the physical properties and quality of the desired product, possibly causing environmental toxicity. At the same time, the amount of gold was observed during the leaching process to increase its content in the solid phase for the possibility of recovery and subsequent extraction of the precious metal. Sodium sulfide works very effectively on sulfide minerals which include tetrahedrite, and sodium hydroxide eliminates the hydrolysis of sulfur which slows leaching. The leaching kinetics were carried out with a duration of five hours, and based on volume sampling at certain time intervals from three samples, with the characteristic NaOH concentration, the leaching efficiency was observed from the results with atomic absorption spectrometry. The solid residue containing the tetrahedrite concentrate was analyzed through X-ray photoelectron analysis spectrometry, from which the % solids content was determined, and it is also known to deduce the leached amount of metals for each sample.

Automated summary

This article focuses on the alkaline leaching of gold-bearing tetrahedrite concentrate using a solution containing sodium sulfide and sodium hydroxide. This selective leaching process may introduce heavy and waste metals into the solution, potentially impacting the physical properties and quality of the desired product and causing environmental toxicity. Additionally, the leaching process was observed to increase the gold content in the solid phase, allowing for recovery and extraction of the precious metal. Sodium sulfide effectively acts on sulfide minerals while sodium hydroxide prevents sulfur hydrolysis, which slows down the leaching process. The leaching kinetics were studied over a five-hour duration and the leaching efficiency was evaluated by atomic absorption spectrometry using volume sampling at specific time intervals. X-ray photoelectron analysis spectrometry was utilized to analyze the solid residue and determine the percentage of solids content, as well as deduce the leached amount of metals for each sample.