Effects of roasting pretreatment on zinc leaching from complicated zinc ores

Abstract Roasting pretreatment and ammonia leaching were performed to extract zinc from complicated zinc ores. The residue of the unroasted ore showed that the zinc containing phase ZnCO3 cannot be effectively leached in the ammonia leaching system. Mineral phase transformation of ZnCO3 takes place at a roasting temperature of 673 K, and this is the reason for the improvement of zinc leaching recovery. Additionally, the parameters that can influence the leaching rate of zinc such as the calcined temperature, the total ammonia concentration, the ratio of liquid to solid, the stirring speed and the leaching time were also investigated. Zinc leaching recovery from the complicated zinc ores could reach 84.7% under the following optimized experiment conditions: roasting temperature of 673 K, leaching temperature of 298 K, stirring speed of 500 rpm, total ammonia concentration of 6 mol/l, liquid to solid ratio of 11:1 and leaching time of 60 min. Compared to the zinc leaching recovery from unroasted ore (49.7%, ammonia concentration 6 mol/l), roasting pretreatment and optimization of process parameters can increase the zinc leaching recovery by 70.4%.