摘要 |
Cuprous chloride, which is contained in a reduced leach solution or pregnant liquor, can be recovered as a complex salt of alkali metal chloride, such as potassium chloride, or alkaline earth metal chloride or ammonium chloride. The salts are produced by oxidation of a copper ore, such as chalcopyrite, with ferric chloride and cupric chloride, and after removal of insolubles, by adding sufficient metallic copper to the solution to reduce cupric ions to cuprous ions so as to provide a solution containing 1.5 to 2.5 molal potassium chloride, or other metal or ammonium chloride, and cooling the resultant saturated solution to precipitate the potassium chloride-cuprous chloride complex salts and recovering the complex salts. Also provided as a method for recovery of pure copper metal by electrolysis of solutions derived from the complex salts wherein the impurities are diverted to an anode loop which is separated from the cathode loop by a diaphragm.
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