Report of Investigations 8961: Electrolytic Reduction of Cobalt in Ammoniacal Leach Solutions

Details

• Journal Article:
  MISSING
• Personal Author:
  Hundley, Gary L. ; Phillips, Thomas A. ; Siemens, Richard E.
• Description:
  The Bureau of Mines has devised and demonstrated an ammoniacal sulfate leach process for recovering nickel and cobalt from low- grade domestic laterites. Solvent extraction of cobalt, one of the process steps, requires the reduction of hexammine complexes of co3+ to co2+ in an ammoniacal leach solution. Previously, reduction was accomplished using cobalt metal shot in a column. This report presents experimental results and an economic evaluation comparing two alternate techniques with the shot column: (1) an electrolytic reduction cell with an extended surface area cathode and (2) direct electrowinning from purified leach solution using a cell with a fluid bed cathode. The second alternative eliminates the conventional solvent extraction-electrowinning steps. The costs of the three methods, based on the requirements of a proposed commercial-sized plant, including all unit operations, were determined by the Bureau's process evaluation group. The operating costs for the shot column,$1.19/Kg CO, and for electrolytic reduction, $1.20/Kg, are essentially the same, but the cost of direct electrowinning, $3.77/Kg CO, would eliminate this method as a practical alternative. The capital cost of approximately $14.4 million for reduction in a shot column is much higher than the approximately $4.4 million for electroreduction. [Description provided by NIOSH]
• Subjects:
  Cobalt Mining Occupational Health Safety
• Source:
  MISSING :20 pages
• Series:
  NIOSH Numbered Publications   ; Mining Publications  
• Subseries:
  Report of Investigations
• Document Type:
  Text
• Genre:
  Report
• Place as Subject:
  United States
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Division:
  AVRC - Avondale Research Center
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Pages in Document:
  25 pdf pages
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:10004552
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  1985
• Peer Reviewed:
  False
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:b0c7627ecea9e54df7efc2f659480fb9779b785181bdc2a836396154dccfa222123eb8af9ff821e6d342db72c798050e9d978c376cb0880ee48149b666f2d08d
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/10457/cdc_10457_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 1.33 MB ]