National Mineral Resources University (Mining University) (Russia):

Isakov A. E., Ph. D. in Engineering Sciences, Associate Professor, omnp@spmi.ru

Matveeva V. A., Ph. D. in Engineering Sciences, Head of Laboratory, poveriya@mail.ru

The Kovdorskoye deposit complex magnetite-apatite-baddeleyite ores processing causes 8 million m3 tailings annually. Ground tailings, disposed in tailings storage facility, generate a negative impact on all components of the environment, in particular, surface and ground waters. As a result of the TSF operation, about 20 million m3 of influent seepage waste water are discharged into bodies of water annually, waste water manganese concentration exceeding the maximum allowable concentration for fisheries stream by the factor of 100. Manganese is not a target valuable component to be recovered at the deposit, but its mass fraction in complex ferruginous and low-ferruginous apatite-carbonate ores reaches 0.40–0.52 % in terms of the equivalent amount of MnO. In order to solve the existing problem, laboratory studies of the Kovdorskoye deposit vermiculite sorption properties were conducted. In the course of the experiment, effect of vermiculite disintegration method upon its sorption capacity with respect to manganese cation (II) was established. Impact mill and rotary crusher with cutter were used for samples crushing. Under laboratory conditions, it was proved that layer-by-layer disintegration in rotary crusher with cutter leads to vermiculite sorption capacity increase by 36 % on the average, if compared with vermiculite samples crushed in impact mill. At a later stage, it is also expedient to perform studies of vermiculite layer-by-layer crushing in cone inertial crushers (CID) that permit to disintegrate material along cleavage planes. Main sorption characteristics of layer-by-layer disintegrated vermiculite samples of different size, as well as effects of physical and chemical parameters, as temperature and pH, on sorption process, were established. On the basis of the experimental results, effectiveness of layer-by-layer disintegrated vermiculite application in waste water purification from manganese (II) was demonstrated.

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