Investigation of mechanical and thermal activation on metal extraction from red mud

Red mud is an inevitable and under-utilized byproduct of the aluminium industry. The current study evaluates the effect of mechanical and thermal activation on the acid leaching of red mud. The acid leaching of the pretreated product is followed by add-base treatment to precipitate the dissolved aluminium values from solution and enrich the residue with Fe and Ti values. Mild add leaching yielded similar to 76% aluminium dissolution with 81% silicon removal. The direct acid leaching resulted in dissociation of sodium aluminosilicate; meanwhile, gibbsite phase remains in the residue. The mechanical milling for 1 h enhanced the aluminium dissolution to 89.5% with silicon and iron dissolution of 98.5 and 9.6%, respectively. The silica and iron oxide values were separated before HCl leaching by thermal pretreatment step using microwave heating with NaOH and carbon additives respectively. The sodium silicate and sodium aluminate phases formed during alkali thermal treatment resulted in similar to 33% silicon and similar to 27% aluminium removal by water washing. Meanwhile, HCl leaching of the water wash residue resulted in 82% aluminium dissolution with 70% recovery and residue containing similar to 52% Fe2O3, and 28% TiO2 is obtained. The carbothermal reduction yielded iron-rich magnetic concentrate having 48% iron grade with 20% metallic iron, and similar to 83% iron recovery. Leaching of the non-magnetic fraction containing hercynite and fayalite as the major aluminium and silicon bearing phases resulted in 81% aluminium dissolution with overall aluminium recovery of only 37%. Mullite formation is also observed in the precipitate with a high Al/Si molar ratio. The carbothermal route was found as an energy-efficient route, whereas the mechanical milling route yielded maximum Al extraction of similar to 90% with Fe and Ti content of 41.1% and 16.8% in the residue. (C) 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

Red mud, an under-utilized byproduct of the aluminium industry, was subjected to mechanical and thermal activation to enhance acid leaching efficiency. The study found that different treatment methods resulted in varying dissolution rates of aluminium, silicon, and iron in the residue.