A Novel Red Mud Treatment Process : Process design and preliminary results

A novel energy and exergy efficient process is being developed under the EC-funded ENEXAL project, for the direct transformation of red mud into valuable products, such as pig –iron and mineral wool. The novel process utilizes a dust treating electric arc furnace (EAF) to achieve the carbothermic reduction of the red mud waste towards the production of pig iron and viscous slag suitable for direct mineral wool production. Thus the environmental footprint of the Bayer process is reduced substantially, as the initial bauxite ore is exploited in full and no new solid wastes are produced. Economically, besides solving the red mud disposal problem, the single step co-production of two highly valuable byproducts (pig iron and mineral wool) has the potential to significantly increase the versatility and profit margin of the alumina producing industry. In this paper a thermodynamic model of the process is developed and verified both by small scale lab experiments as well as exploratory EAF test results.