Ural Federal University, Yekaterinburg, Russia
A. A. Babintsev, Master’s Student, e-mail: babintsev.a.a@yandex.ru
O. Yu. Makovskaya, Associate Professor of the Non-Ferrous Metallurgy Department, Candidate of Technical Sciences, e-mail: o.i.makovskaia@urfu.ru
V. G. Lobanov, Associate Professor of the Non-Ferrous Metallurgy Department, Candidate of Technical Sciences, e-mail: lobanov-vl@yandex.ru

The article describes the chlorination process of baddeleyite concentrates in the melt of chlorides of alkali and alkali-earth metals. A method of chlorination in the melt has technological advantages in comparison with dry chlorination. The authors studied the concentrate of grade PB-0 from Kovdor Mining and Beneficiation Plant, amounting to a total of 99.5% zirconium and hafnium dioxides. The baddeleyite concentrate, unlike the zirconium concentrate, contains low impurities, making easier subsequent recovery ope rations of zirconium and hafnium tetrachlorides. To chlorate the baddeleyite concentrate, the authors used melts of КСl, NaCl – KCl, NaCl – KCl – MgCl₂, KCl – MgCl₂, NaCl and СаCl₂. It has been established that the best parameters of both the percentage of the transition of zirconium into tetrachloride (over 65%), and the chlorination rate (2.07·10^–3 g/(g·min)) are attributed to the NaCl – KCl melt. The authors studied the relation between the chlorination process in the NaCl – KCl melt and temperature. Experimentally determined apparent activation energy within a temperature range of 800–1000 ^oC was 18.49 kJ/mol, and within a temperature range of 750–800 ^oC, 176.07 kJ/mol. Thus, at 750–800 ^oC the chlorination process takes place in a kinetic mode, and at 800–1000 ^oC — in a diffusion mode. It has been established that when the process temperature increases over 900 ^oC, there is no significant increase in weight of obtained zirconium tetrachloride. Moreover, an increase in chlorination temperature entails a greater transition of impurity elements into zirconium tetrachloride. In view of this, to conduct the process, the recommended temperature range is 900–950 ^oC.

The research was sponsored by funds, amounting to income from trust management of the Endowment Fund of the Institute of New Materials and Technologies, Ural Federal University, established with a participation of JSC Chelyabinsk Zinc Plant.

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