Team:British Columbia/ProjectBiomining

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Our access to easily extractable copper is gradually diminishing as demands for copper continues to grow worldwide. To meet these demands, non-traditional, metallurgically challenging deposits are expected to become more prevalent, thereby forcing us to deal with more complex, and lower-grade ores containing higher levels of impurities.  Arsenic-challenged deposits is a concern for the copper mining industry as arsenic produces hazardous fumes and oxide dusts during the smelting process. Smelting with arsenic therefore poses a significant risk to the health of the workers and to the environment. Safe removal and disposal of stabilized arsenic is often difficult and costly. The mining industry has developed several methods for dealing with arsenic impurities, which includes precipitation with scorodite and pressure hydrometallurgical procedures (150C and 1380kPa) for processing high concentration of arsenic while extracting copper in parallel. However, many procedures requires an enormous amount of energy or additional acidic chemicals to help selectively separate arensic-containing minerals in the ore mixtures. With stricter legislation in place, the mining industry is facing increasing pressure to progressively reduce the amount of allowable arsenic concentrations for smelters. Consequently, fines and penalties are set for arsenic concentrations exceeding 0.2%, while ores past 0.5% arsenic concentrations are rejected by smelters.  
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A Separation Problem:
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Our access to easily extractable copper is gradually diminishing as demands for copper continues to grow worldwide. To meet these demands, non-traditional, metallurgically challenging deposits are expected to become more prevalent, thereby forcing us to deal with more complex, and lower-grade ores containing higher levels of impurities.  Arsenic-challenged deposits is a concern for the copper mining industry as arsenic produces hazardous fumes and oxide dusts during the smelting process. Smelting with arsenic therefore poses a significant risk to the health of the workers and to the environment. Furthermore, safe removal and disposal of stabilized arsenic is often difficult and costly.   With stricter legislation in place, the mining industry is facing increasing pressure to progressively reduce the amount of allowable arsenic concentrations for smelters. Consequently, fines and penalties are set for arsenic concentrations exceeding 0.2%, while ores past 0.5% arsenic concentrations are rejected by smelters. Therefore, there is increasing precedence for removing arsenic-containing minerals such as enargite (Cu3AsS4)from relevant minerals, such as chalcopyrite (CuFeS2), during the flotation process. However, separation is often conflicted with shared flotation properties between enargite and the associated valuable minerals. The mining industry has developed several methods for dealing with arsenic impurities, which includes precipitation with scorodite and pressure hydrometallurgical procedures (150C and 1380kPa) for processing high concentration of arsenic while extracting copper in parallel. However, many procedures requires an enormous amount of energy or additional acidic chemicals to help selectively separate arensic-containing minerals in the ore mixtures.
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There is increasing precedence for removing arsenic-containing minerals such as enargite (Cu3AsS4)from relevant minerals, chalcopyrite (CuFeS2), during the flotation process. However, separation is often conflicted as enargite posesses similar floation properties as valuable minerals such
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Our solution:
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It would be more economically and environmentally beneficial to remove the minerals containing arsenic at an earlier stage such as during flotation. Their separation is nevertheless difficult as they generally have similar flotation behaviour to the valuable minerals with which they are associated. This is the case in separating arsenopyrite (FeAsS) from pyrite, or removing enargite (Cu3AsS4) and tennantite (Cu12As4S13) from covellite (CuS), chalcocite (Cu2S) and chalcopyrite (CuFeS2). Apart from arsenopyrite, the amount of literature dealing with the separation of arsenic minerals is scarce. One of the potential separation methods relies on the selective oxidation of sulfide minerals due to differences in their electrochemical properties (e.g., Tolley et al., 1996, Byrne et al., 1995, Kydros et al., 1993, Wang et al., 1992, Beattie and Poling, 1988, Guongming and Hongen, 1989 and Chander, 1985). Oxidation can promote the adsorption of collectors, such as xanthate, at low to moderate levels of oxidation, or prevent their adsorption at high levels of oxidation by creating a physical barrier of oxidation products for their diffusion to the mineral surface.
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We, the UBC iGEM team, feel that separation can be done other ways that does not have to  
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Chocolate cake macaroon bear claw lollipop. Carrot cake chocolate cake tiramisu jujubes chocolate cake cake pastry jelly beans gummies. Powder tootsie roll ice cream candy lemon drops pastry. Biscuit sweet sweet roll brownie chupa chups sugar plum applicake fruitcake tootsie roll. Danish topping chocolate bar brownie jelly bonbon oat cake halvah. Oat cake sesame snaps jujubes oat cake. Candy lollipop cake gummi bears topping danish. Lemon drops muffin halvah chocolate bar croissant croissant brownie cotton candy. Tart cake macaroon.
Chocolate cake macaroon bear claw lollipop. Carrot cake chocolate cake tiramisu jujubes chocolate cake cake pastry jelly beans gummies. Powder tootsie roll ice cream candy lemon drops pastry. Biscuit sweet sweet roll brownie chupa chups sugar plum applicake fruitcake tootsie roll. Danish topping chocolate bar brownie jelly bonbon oat cake halvah. Oat cake sesame snaps jujubes oat cake. Candy lollipop cake gummi bears topping danish. Lemon drops muffin halvah chocolate bar croissant croissant brownie cotton candy. Tart cake macaroon.

Revision as of 00:02, 18 October 2014

2014 UBC iGEM

Biomining

A Separation Problem: Our access to easily extractable copper is gradually diminishing as demands for copper continues to grow worldwide. To meet these demands, non-traditional, metallurgically challenging deposits are expected to become more prevalent, thereby forcing us to deal with more complex, and lower-grade ores containing higher levels of impurities. Arsenic-challenged deposits is a concern for the copper mining industry as arsenic produces hazardous fumes and oxide dusts during the smelting process. Smelting with arsenic therefore poses a significant risk to the health of the workers and to the environment. Furthermore, safe removal and disposal of stabilized arsenic is often difficult and costly. With stricter legislation in place, the mining industry is facing increasing pressure to progressively reduce the amount of allowable arsenic concentrations for smelters. Consequently, fines and penalties are set for arsenic concentrations exceeding 0.2%, while ores past 0.5% arsenic concentrations are rejected by smelters. Therefore, there is increasing precedence for removing arsenic-containing minerals such as enargite (Cu3AsS4)from relevant minerals, such as chalcopyrite (CuFeS2), during the flotation process. However, separation is often conflicted with shared flotation properties between enargite and the associated valuable minerals. The mining industry has developed several methods for dealing with arsenic impurities, which includes precipitation with scorodite and pressure hydrometallurgical procedures (150C and 1380kPa) for processing high concentration of arsenic while extracting copper in parallel. However, many procedures requires an enormous amount of energy or additional acidic chemicals to help selectively separate arensic-containing minerals in the ore mixtures.

Our solution: We, the UBC iGEM team, feel that separation can be done other ways that does not have to

Chocolate cake macaroon bear claw lollipop. Carrot cake chocolate cake tiramisu jujubes chocolate cake cake pastry jelly beans gummies. Powder tootsie roll ice cream candy lemon drops pastry. Biscuit sweet sweet roll brownie chupa chups sugar plum applicake fruitcake tootsie roll. Danish topping chocolate bar brownie jelly bonbon oat cake halvah. Oat cake sesame snaps jujubes oat cake. Candy lollipop cake gummi bears topping danish. Lemon drops muffin halvah chocolate bar croissant croissant brownie cotton candy. Tart cake macaroon. Jelly beans bear claw marshmallow pastry topping tootsie roll halvah. Unerdwear.com icing caramels dessert dessert jujubes. Soufflé jelly beans biscuit chocolate unerdwear.com. Bonbon pastry sugar plum tiramisu cotton candy sweet. Tiramisu topping candy canes caramels tart cheesecake halvah cupcake croissant. Carrot cake cake jujubes jujubes cotton candy ice cream gummies sugar plum icing.

© 2014 UBC iGEM

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