Improving Zinc Recovery from Steelmaking Dust by Switching from Conventional Heating to Microwave Heating

Recently, microwave energy has attracted increasing interest for accelerating thermal reactions. This study investigated the impact of microwave heating on the zinc recovery rate from electric arc furnace (EAF) and chromium converter (CRC) dusts. The results indicated that microwave heating required a lower temperature to recover zinc from EAF and CRC dusts compared with that in conventional thermal heating. For CRC dust, zinc recovery rates of 37.84% and 97.43% were obtained with conventional and microwave heating, respectively, at 850 degrees C. For EAF dust, zinc recovery rates of 79.88% and 98.20% were obtained with conventional and microwave heating, respectively, at 850 degrees C. The improved zinc recovery in this study was concluded to results from the rapidity of microwave heating and the interactions between the electromagnetic microwave field and the molecules of heated materials.

Automated summary

This study found that microwave heating significantly improved zinc recovery rates from EAF and CRC dusts compared to conventional thermal heating, requiring lower temperatures. This indicates that microwave heating is an effective method for enhancing metal recovery efficiency.