INTEGRATED METHOD FOR RECOVERING PLATINUM AND PALLADIUM METALS IN THE PROCESSING OF COPPER-NICKEL SULFIDE ORES AND REJECTED PRODUCTS Russian patent published in 2001 - IPC

FIELD: mining industry and precious metal technologies. SUBSTANCE: ore is transported, subjected to express analysis involving x-ray-radiometric technique, after which follow x-ray-radiometric great-portion sorting and single-lump separation, centrifugal concentration on Knelson concentrators, and in-vat bacterial and chemical leaching involving heating of solution in winter and autumn-spring periods. Sorting and separation give 5 products with different contents of platinum and palladium metals: enriched product, three intermediate products, and nonutilizable waste. Enriched product is processed to recovery platinum and palladium metals. The first intermediate product is subjected to one or two processing operations of Knelson concentrator and the second one is processed one to four times. Tailings of the two processed intermediate products are combined with third intermediate product and subjected to leaching. EFFECT: enabled involvement of poor and out-of-budget ores into processing. 8 cl, 1 dwg, 2 tbl