Zircon dissociation in air plasma through a low power transferred arc plasma torch

Thermal plasma dissociation offers a convenient and attractive route to prepare zirconium oxide from zircon mineral. Transferred and non-transferred arc plasma torches have been used to study zircon dissociation. The major thrust has been to accomplish complete dissociation and make the process simpler and cost effective. Technologically, this has been attempted in argon-fired plasma reactors using higher electrical power. The present work reports a cost effective low power transferred arc plasma (TAP) processing method for dissociating zircon by using air as the plasma forming gas. Phase composition and microstructure formation of the dissociated zircon were examined by XRD and SEM with EDX. Experimental results showed that the torch input power and processing time strongly influenced the dissociation percentage as well as the microstructure formation. Further, obtained results revealed that the air plasma medium significantly improved the percentage of zircon dissociation rather than argon plasma medium at 10 and 15 kW power levels. The air plasma gives complete zircon dissociation at 10 kW power with 5 min of processing. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd and Techna Group S.r.l. All rights reserved.