Laboratory Testing & General Mineral Processing Engineering

Laboratory Testing & General Mineral Processing Engineering

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Acidity of ores (3 replies)

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Oscar96UIS
6 years ago
Oscar96UIS 6 years ago

How can I determine the acidity of an ore?. Where can I get more information about that.

T
tesaygo1
6 years ago
tesaygo1 6 years ago

You can use a soil pH meter or just buy a pH meter, for you to know the acidity of the ore it self.

D
Dave Tahija
6 years ago
Dave Tahija 6 years ago

You most likely are more concerned about how much base it will take to neutralize the ore rather than just pH. There are standard laboratory procedures for this. In general, you take a split-down sample, ground/pulverized to a specified fineness, like minus 100 mesh, and add water to form a dilute slurry. Then a base is slowly added, commonly dilute NaOH, and the pH monitored. By keeping track of the amount of NaOH needed to titrate to a target pH (such as pH 5), the acid consumption of the ore can be calculated. Although the measurements are generally made as mmol/gram, the results are often converted to kg lime per ton.

R
Bhaduri
6 years ago
Bhaduri 6 years ago

Dave is correct; however, the most accurate procedural would be to perform a Leco C & S for organic/inorganic C & elemental/sulfide/sulfate S; very simplistically, the neutralization rxn may be represented as:

S2- + 3/2O2 + H2O = H2SO4

H2SO4 + CO32- = SO42- + CO2 + H2O

A S2-/CO32- ratio hence represents the ore acidity.

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