Ausmelt / Isasmelt Matte Smelting

Basic Operations
Ausmelt/Isasmelt copper smelting entails dropping moist solid feed into a
tall cylindrical furnace while blowing oxygen-enriched air through a vertical
lance into the furnace's matte/slag bath. The products of the process are a
matte/slag mixture and a strong SO2 offgas. The matte/slag mixture is
tapped periodically into a fuel-fired or electric setting furnace for
separation. The settled matte (~60% Cu) is sent to conventional
converting. The slag (0.70% Cu) is discarded.
The offgas (25% SO2) is drawn from the top of the smelting furnace
through a vertical flue. It is passed through a waste heat boiler, gas
cleaning and on to a sulfuric acid plant. A small amount of oxygen is blown
through the side of the smelting furnace or lance (about halfway up) to
ensure that sulfur leaves the furnace as SO2 rather than S2. This prevents
sulfur condensation in the gas cleaning system.
Most of the energy for smelting comes from oxidizing the concentrate
charge. Additional energy is provided by combusting (i) oil, gas, or coal
fines blown through the vertical lance and (ii) coal fines in the solid charge.
Feed materials
Ausmelt/Isasmelt feed is moist concentrate, flux and recycle materials,
sometimes pelletized. Drying of the feed is not necessary because the
smelting reactions take place in the matte/slag bath rather than above it.
Moist feed also decreases dust evolution.
Oxygen enrichment of the air blown into an Ausmelt/Isasmelt furnace is
standard practice. The blast typically contains 50 to 60 volume% O2.
O2 levels higher than this tend to cause excessive lance wear. Because of
(i) this upper limit on O2 enrichment and (ii) the presence of moisture in
the solid feed, autothermal operation is usually not achieved.
Instead, hydrocarbon fuel is added. Ausmelt/Isasmelt furnaces are
designed to use natural gas, oil and coal. A cool lance tip is important for
reducing lance wear. As a result, coal is often added to the feed as a
partial substitute for flammable fuel oil and natural gas.

The Isasmelt Furnace and Lance(Isasmelt Technology)

Figure 1 shows an Isasmelt furnace. It is vertically aligned steel barrel,
~3.5 m in diameter and ~12 m high. Depending on size, it smelts up to
3000 tonnes of concentrate per day. It is lined inside with chromemagnesite refractory, sometimes backed with copper water-cooling blocks.
Its roof consists of water-cooled copper slabs or steel panels.

Figure 1: Isasmelt furnace

Smelting Mechanisms
Ausmelt/Isasmelt smelting is different from flash smelting in that the
smelting reactions take place primarily in the bath rather than above the
melt. As a result, the reaction sequence is different. It is commonly
believed that dissolved magnetite in the slag serves as a catalyst of sorts
for the overall process. The reaction sequence is as follows:

As a result, the presence of about 5% magnetite in the slag is important.

This requires a low bath temperature (1150-1200C) and low silica/iron
ratio (0.7-0.8 for Isasmelt, 0.6-0.7 for Ausmelt.

The Technology
One of the additional uses of Ausmelt technology is to allow for the
recovering of copper from non-sulfide materials, particularly slags and
sludges. Its ability to control air and fuel inputs means that conditions can
be changed from oxidizing to reducing without transferring the material to
a second furnace. This is particularly effective for smelting Cu/Ni
hydrometallurgical residues.
The Technology can be applied to a wide range of applications and uses.
This flexibility is due to its inherent ability to be operated and controlled
over a wide range of oxygen potentials, from strongly oxidizing, neutral,
through to strongly reducing. Operating temperatures range from 900C
(lead) to 1400C and above (ferrous applications). This flexibility is shown
in Figure 2.

Figure 2: Operating Flexibility of Ausmelt Technology

The Ausmelt furnace system is based on the use of a top submerged
lance to inject combustion gases and fuel into a molten slag bath. The
main features of the technology are illustrated in Figure 3.

Figure 3: Features of Ausmelt Technology

The technology provides a variety of benefits and features including:
Submerged injection resulting in rapid mixing and fast reaction rates
High reaction intensity allowing a high level of productivity per unit area of
furnace. This minimizes the heat losses and fuel requirements per unit of
product
The use of non-consumable lances, using controlled cooling to solidify
slag on its outer surface, protecting it from attack in a highly aggressive
environment
The use of a range of fuels, including coal, natural gas and fuel oils. This
allows those fuels most readily and economically available to be used
The ability to use oxygen enriched air to raise productivity, reduce offgas
volumes and increase acid gas tenors when needed
The capability to easily control the degree of oxidation and reduction by
adjusting the fuel to oxygen ratio in the lance, and the addition of reductant
coal with the feed
The use of a stationary, well-sealed reactor to minimize fugitive emissions

The ability to implement installations as either new plants or in retrofit

installations
The ability to use simple agglomeration and feed-rate control systems
Waste heat recovery, when required, using conventional equipment
A plant that is simple to operate and does not require a large number of
highly skilled operators
The use of advanced control systems to improve process control and
product quality
High level control of the process chemistry to ensure that the slag
produced is disposable without further treatment
High level control of the process chemistry for removal of impurities such
as arsenic, antimony, bismuth and halides
Summary
Ausmelt and Isasmelt smelting is done in vertically aligned cylindrical
furnaces ~3.5 m diameter and 12 m high. The smelting entails:
Dropping moist concentrate, flux and recycle materials into a molten
matte/slag bath in a hot furnace
Blowing oxygen-enriched air through a vertical lance into the matte/slag
bath
Most of the energy for smelting is obtained from oxidizing the
concentrate's Fe and S. The vertical lance consists of two pipes-the inner
for supplying supplementary hydrocarbon fuel, the annulus for supplying
oxygen-enriched air. The outer pipe penetrates ~0.3m into the bath. The
inner pipe ends ~1 m above the bath. The oxygen-enriched blast is swirled
down the lower part of the lance by helical swirl vanes. This causes rapid
heat extraction from the lance into the cool blast and solidification of a
protective slag coating on the lance`s outer surface. This is a unique
feature of the process. The principal product of the furnace is a
matte/mixture. It is tapped into a hydrocarbon fired or electric settling
furnace. The products, after settling, are 60% matte and 0.7% Cu slag.
THE LEAD SMELTING PROCESS USING AUSMELT TECHNOLOGY

Ausmelt Technology offers an efficient means of processing a wide range

of primary concentrates and secondary lead materials to produce lead
bullion, especially because the partial oxygen pressure (pO2) can be
readily controlled to achieve the desired process conditions.
The complete Ausmelt lead production process for primary concentrates
consists of 3 process stages; (i) Smelting, (ii) Reduction and (iii) Fuming.
Depending on the scale of production all 3 stages can be carried out in a
single furnace as a batch operation. Alternatively, multiple, sequential
furnaces can be used to enable continuous operation.
Depending upon client preference and the availability of existing furnaces
it is also possible to integrate one or more Ausmelt processing stages to
achieve the most efficient lead production flowsheet to best suit site
requirements. Figure 1 shows a schematic flowsheet for a Multi Furnace
Lead Process.

Figure 1: Schematic Flowsheet for Mutli Furnace Lead Process

The benefits and features of Ausmelt Lead Technology compared to other
lead smelting technologies lie with its submerged lance operation:

 The key to this lead technology is the ability of TSL to manipulate

pO2accurately as dictated by the metallurgy of the relevant processing
stage.
Low capital cost relative to other technologies due to simple furnace
construction & peripheral system arrangement.
Low operating cost resulting from a combination of low energy
consumption, high availability, minimal maintenance requirements and low
manpower needs. The process operates with very high oxygen utilisation
during the Smelting stage (>95%) and can employ high levels of oxygen
enrichment to minimise fuel consumption and offgas volume. The process
does not require the use of expensive (and difficult to source) coke as a
reductant and can utilise the lowest cost available fuel source.
It has an excellent environmental performance due to low fugitive
emissions from the well sealed, stationary reactor and can efficiently
recover SO2 in the form of sulphuric acid or gypsum from the
concentrated process offgas stream.
High degree of flexibility in terms of feed material blend that can be
treated to optimise productivity and economic performance.
Intense mixing, resulting in high reaction rates and high metal
productivity per m3 of bath, hence a small plant footprint and easy to
retrofit into existing operations.
High annual plant availability due its relative simple operation, which is
also well suited to remote locations. For optimum results the lead smelting
process does need to be run astutely with the support of metallurgists with
a good understanding of lead metallurgy. Ausmelt provides this training as
part of its service package.
Currently Ausmelt has two reference plants processing predominantly
secondary lead feed and residues sources, including Korea Zincs plant in
South Korea and Metaleurops plant in Nordenham, Germany. A further
four Ausmelt plants are in operation or under design for the processing of
primary lead feed materials, including HZLs lead plant in Chanderiya,
India.
The technical feasibility of recovering copper, nickel and cobalt from
smelting and converting slags using Ausmelts top-submerged lancing
process has been demonstrated at the pilot-plant scale and in several

commercial applications. Process conditions may be tailored to achieve

the maximum economic recovery of valuable metals and to yield a product
composition that is suitable for downstream processing requirements.
Strong economic justification for a slag-cleaning process exists where the
contained value of metals recovered exceeds $50 per tonne of slag
treated. The top-submerged lance system offers a relatively low-cost
solution where this value is predominantly associated with the recovery of
cobalt.
Maximizing the recovery of copper, nickel, and cobalt is critical for the
economic operation of smelters treating copper, nickel, cobalt feed
materials. With the current trend toward the production of higher matte
grades and the adoption of continuous converting processes, effective
slag cleaning is of increasing importance.
The versatility of the technology has been demonstrated for a range of
processes, ranging from copper converting under highly oxidizing
conditions to iron-making under highly reducing conditions.
The most recent development is the construction of a demonstration
furnace (2t/h feed rate) at Whyalla in South Australian Steel and Energy
project, with the production of 2.5 million t/y of pig iron as the ultimate
goal. Other recent commercial applications are listed in Table 1; most of
these applications include either a purpose designed, slag-cleaning
furnace or a slag-cleaning process stage.

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