Investigation of the possibility of copper recovery from the flotation tailings by acid leaching

The flotation tailings pond of the Bor Copper Mine poses a great ecological problem not only for the town of Bor but also for the surrounding soils and watercourses. Since the old flotation tailings contain about 0.2% of copper oil the average, we investigated their leaching with sulphuric acid in the absence and presence of an oxidant. The aim was to determine the leaching kinetics of copper and iron as affected by various factors such as: the pH value of the leach solution, stirring speed, pulp density, particle size, concentration of ferric ions, temperature and time for leaching. The average copper and iron recovery obtained was from 60% to 70% and from 2% to 3%. respectively. These results indicate that the old flotation tailings pond represents an important source of secondary raw material For the extraction of copper and that it should he valorized rather than land reclamation. At the end of the paper, a mechanism of dissolution of copper and iron minerals front the tailings was described. (C) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.