PROCESSING

Concorde flying into Australian nickel operation

METSO Outotec is providing a flotation solution, based on Australian-developed technology, to a major Western Australian nickel producer as part of its concentrator modernisation for an undisclosed sum.

 An artist's impression of a Metso Outotec Concorde Cell.

An artist's impression of a Metso Outotec Concorde Cell.

The site is one of the world's largest nickel producers.

The flotation cells, which use MO's soon to be launched Concorde Cell flotation technology, are scheduled to be started up in 2022.

The Concorde Cell, which is to be officially launched in the northern hemisphere in autumn, uses a high-pressure aerated slurry jet through a choke to force the bubbles and particles to attach.

The technology was originally invented by professor Graeme Jameson to improve ultrafine particle flotation.

MO separation business line vice-president Paul Sohlberg said intensive research and development efforts had allowed it to create the Concorde Cell for superior performance in fine and ultrafine particle recovery.

 

"This is in response to the global industry trend towards efficient use of the Earth's resources with more environmentally efficient technologies for more finely disseminated and complex orebodies," he said.

This is not the only technological advancement MO has been working on in recent times.

It has also launched a compact elution and goldroom plant based on pre-engineered modules to reduce engineering, delivery and construction, as well as commissioning time and investment cost.

The MO elution and goldroom plant can be delivered standalone or as part of a holistic gold process solution to enable onsite gold dore production.

The elution and goldroom plant has a heat recovery circuit to minimise energy consumption and efficient carbon dewatering to maximise carbon and regeneration and minimise energy losses.

The plant is available with four levels of automation: standard, upgraded, advanced and premium, and can be controlled either from a standalone control room or via the plant's distributed control system.

MO can model the plant's acid wash, elution and electrowinning circuits using its proprietary HSC Chemistry software product.

The elution and goldroom plant is the final step in the gold process flowsheet. It is where the gold cyanide complex is desorbed from the activated carbon, recovered as a metal in the electrowinning cells and refined to dore bars in the gold room.

The activated carbon is regenerated for reuse in the cyanide leaching section.

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