US EPA

2635829 

Journal Article 

Pressure acid leaching of Caldag lateritic nickel ore: An alternative to heap leaching 

Onal, MAliR; Topkaya, YAli 

2014 

Yes 

Hydrometallurgy
ISSN: 0304-386X 

142 

98-107 

10.1016/j.hydromet.2013.11.011 

WOS:000331688200011 

In this study, the leachability of Caldag lateritic nickel ore under high pressure acid leaching (HPAL) conditions was investigated. Several HPAL parameters were tested in a comparative manner since in many cases, the extraction efficiencies of Caldag ore sample were more than 90% for nickel and cobalt. After the optimization of the process parameters, it was found that 94.1% nickel and 94.0% cobalt could be extracted under the conditions of 325 kg sulfuric acid/tonne of dry ore, 250 degrees C leaching temperature, 1 h leaching duration and 100% - 1 mm particle size. Under these conditions, scandium also present in the ore was highly extracted into the pregnant leach solution. The results obtained were compared with the reported pilot plant testing results of atmospheric heap leaching by European Nickel PLC. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. 

Hydrometallurgy; Caldag; Nickel; Pressure acid leaching; Scandium