Abstract
It is very important to remove sulfur from complex copper concentrates for smelting them by a carbon reduction process since copper concentrates are progressively becoming complex and low grade. The carbon reduction process largely consists of the oxidation process of complex copper concentrate and smelting process of the oxidized concentrate. In the present work, the kinetics study has been performed on a complex copper concentrate to understand the oxidation process over a temperature range of 998 to 1073 K and an oxygen partial pressure range of 15.20 to 50.66 kPa using a thermogravimetric method. It was found that the oxidation rate was very fast under the whole temperature range and almost 95% of sulfur contained in the concentrate was removed after 15 min at 1073 K under an oxygen partial pressure of 21.28 kPa. Sulfur removal ratio as a function of time has been analyzed by using a shrinking-core model and the effect of oxygen partial pressure has been elucidated.
