Separation Circuits Analysis and Design, Using Sensitivity Analysis

Abstract Sometimes, the recovery and/or concentration of value components can not be done in one operational stage, which is why separation circuits are used. Usually, the component to be separated is distributed with different concentrations into different particle sizes, showing different levels of recovery by size and concentration. Other times, we want to selectively remove more than one value component, taking advantage of differences in the components floatability at different values of pH and pulp potential. In literature, several methods for the design of these circuits have been presented. These methodologies can be classified among those that use heuristics and those that use mathematical optimization techniques. However, none of these options is used actually in industry. This is, the former is very simple to incorporate the complexities of the problem and the latter requires more specialized training for the designer. In this work, we use a sensitivity analysis to analyze and design separation circuits. We study the effect of each stage on the general circuit, identifying relationships between the recovery of each stage and the global recovery of the circuit. Based on these results, we propose a novel methodology to analyze and design separation circuits. This new method can be regarded as hybrid, since it uses a mathematical analysis, coupled with the experience of the designer. An example is given for flotation separation in copper mining.