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Acid Plant Database April 18, 2021
| Owner | Palabora Copper (Pty) Limited |
|
| Location | 1 Copper Road 1389 Phalaborwa Limpopo Province South Africa |
|
| Background |
The company was owned and managed by Rio Tinto.
Rio Tinto owned 57.7% and Anglo American had 16.8% of the shares. On 5
September 2012, the two companies announced their intention to sell their
respective interests in Palabora. On 11 December 2012, Rio Tinto announced
that it has reached a binding sales agreement with a consortium which is
committed to the on-going sustainable management of Palabora. The sale
agreement was concluded in July 2013, and the company's name changed from
Palabora Mining Company to Palabora Copper (Pty) Limited and the new
shareholders are PMC holding 74% and Empowerment Partners holding 26%. Formerly: Member of the world-wide Rio Tinto Group www.riotinto.com |
|
| Website |
www.palabora.com www.palabora.co.za |
|
| Plant | - | |
| Coordinates* | 23° 58' 42" S, 31° 9' 24" E | |
| Type of Plant | Metallurgical | |
| Gas Source |
Copper |
|
| Plant Capacity | 2002:
1300 MTPD 2021: 528 MTPD |
|
| SA/DA | 3/1 DA | |
| Status | Operating | |
| Year Built | 1986 | |
| Technology | - | |
| Contractor | - | |
| Remarks |
The reverberatory furnace off gas (approx. 0.5% SO2) is vented
into the atmosphere. The sulphuric acid is sold to a nearby fertiliser
manufacturer. 2002: Hugo |
|
| Pictures |
 |
|
| General |
Palabora Mining Company Limited extracts and beneficiates copper and
vermiculite from its mines in the Limpopo Province. The company was
incorporated in South Africa in August 1956. It is South Africa’s only
producer of refined copper. The mining of the company’s copper ore-body
commenced in 1956. During the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, the company’s open-pit
copper mine and associated processing plants produced over 2, 7 million
tones of copper. During the early 1990s, the company embarked on a series of feasibility studies on underground mine. In 1996, it announced that it would proceed with the development of an underground block caving mine with a production rate of 30 000 tonnes per day. Dried concentrate is blended with fine quartz flux and reverts, then charged into a reverbatory furnace, which operates at a temperature of 1500ºC. The smelted material settles into two separate layers in the furnace bath - matte (the heavier, containing the copper, at the bottom) and slag. The slag is skimmed off and dumped for possible future re-treatment. The matte contains about 45% copper as well as iron and sulphur. It is transferred to converter furnaces where air is blown through the molten material. This oxidises the iron and some of the sulphur. Silica flux is added, forming an iron rich slag, which is skimmed off and returned to the reverbatory furnace. Once all the iron has been removed, further blowing oxidises the rest of the sulphur, producing "blister" copper that is about 95 - 98% pure. The blister copper is transferred to anode furnaces where the last traces of sulphur are removed by blowing air through the molten metal. Finally, reductant is injected into the furnace to remove any remaining oxygen giving copper to a purity of 99.5% that is cast into copper anodes. A melting/holding furnace is used to supplement production by melting anode scrap returned from the refining process. |
|
| References | Hugo Petersen reference list | |
| News | - | |
MTPD - Metric Tonne per Day
STPD - Short Ton per Day
MTPA - Metric Tonne per Annum STPA - Short Ton per
Annum
SA - Single Absorption
DA - Double Absorption
* Coordinates can be used to
locate plant on Google Earth
