Reclaim of Synthetic Rutile Fines Produced In Ilmenite Beneficiation Process by Agglomeration

Abstract

The synthetic rutile is used as feed stock material for producing rutile TiO2 under chloride route method. The synthetic rutile suitable for chlorination process under fluidized bed reactor was having a specification of TiO2 content above 90 %, silica content less than 2 %, and particle above 100 micron in size. One of the steps in the up-gradation process of ilmenite was leaching with mineral acids. The leach liquor obtained after leaching process is called spent acid. During leaching process, aberration leads to produce ultra fine particles of synthetic rutile which is found suspended in spent acid. A few amount of TiO2 was digested in acid to form hydrated TiO2. The spent acid contains both these ultra fine particles and hydrated TiO2 particles which were allowed to settled and removed from the system as TiO2 sludge. In addition to TiO2 sludge, a small quantity (0.5 0.7 %) of synthetic rutile having particle size less than 100 micron (required specification) were also generated, which is removed by using cyclone and stored as synthetic rutile fines. The quantity of synthetic rutile fines and TiO2 sludge produced are 1.0 MT and 3.0 MT respectively in a production plant having the synthetic rutile production capacity of 140 MT/day. The present invention aims to recover and re-use the synthetic rutile fines and TiO2 sludge generated in the ilmenite beneficiation plant by agglomeration technique. ARTICLE HISTORY Received 13-12-2021 Revised 18-12-2021 Accepted 22-12-2021 Published 12-01-2022