Abstract

An economical and environmentally friendly beneficiation process is of great practical significance for the mining industry to achieve green and sustainable development. This study aims to optimize the traditionalflotation process of MoeBi sulfide ore by using the difference in naturalfloatability of minerals for cleaner production. Single-mineralflotation tests demonstrate that the naturalfloatability of the sulfide minerals investigated decreased in the following order: molybdenite>bismuthinite>pyrite. Molybdenite displayed the best naturalfloatability in a wide pH range, and pyrite exhibited the least naturallyfloatable under alkaline conditions. The moderately naturalfloatability of bismuthinite was observed at the pH below 6, but decreased with the shift of pH to the alkaline region. Batchflotation tests indicate that the collectorless flotation of MoeBi sulfide ore resulted in lowerflotation kinetics but

higher selectivity than those of the collectorflotation process. Industrial-scale tests illustrate that introducing collectorlessflotation into the sequentialflotation in industrial production was a feasible and reliable method of simultaneously increasing economic benefits and improving product quality. The grades of the Mo and Bi concentrates generated from the modifiedflotation process were 2.78% and 2.81% higher than those produced by the traditionalflotation process. The daily consumption of chemical reagents in the modifiedflotation process decreased by more than 10%, reducing the annual cost of flotation reagent by approximately USD 60407.0. Given the characteristics of low reagents dosage, slightly environmental pollution, and high economic benefits, the modifiedflotationflowsheet is a promising separation process that can be extensively employed for mineral sources with similar

mineralogical properties

Keywords:

Molybdenite

Bismuthinite

Pyrite

Naturalfloatability

Collectorlessflotation

Cleaner production