Research Center, “Uralelectromed” JSC, Verkhnyaya Pyshma, Sverdlovsk Oblast, Russia

K. L. Timofeev, Head of a Sector

L. F. Akulich, Head of Laboratory

Ural Federal University named after the first president of Russia B. N. Yeltsin, Ekaterinburg, Russia
S. S. Naboychenko, Head of a Chair of Metallurgy of Heavy Non-Ferrous Metals, e-mail: rectorat@ustu.ru

Office of Strategic Plans, Ural Mining and Metallurgical Company, Verkhnyaya Pyshma, Russia

A. B. Lebed, Chief Specialist of Metallurgy Department

Mine waters contain a significant amount of environmentally hazardous non-ferrous metals. It is possible to remove these metals deeply during the usage of sorption method with selective ionexchange resins. Extraction of zinc is the most complicated process, included in sorption, especially in the conditions with prevail content of harshness ions in solution. This article shows the investigation of kinetic regularities of zinc, calcium and magnesium sorption in water solutions on amine-diacetic ampholyte – Lewatit TP-207. Internal diffusion and chemical interaction are the rate-limiting steps of sorption of impurities from concentrated solutions. The activation energy varies from zinc to magnesium: 12.96 kJ/mol of Zn, 6.87 kJ/mol of Ca and 1.54 kJ/mol of Mg. Decreasing of activation energy in the “Zn – Ca – Mg” range apparently testifies about the zinc complexing with ionite amides, when ion-exchange is characteristic for calcium and magnesium. The biggest affinity of ionite to zinc is confirmed by highest capacity of resin for this cation, in comparison with calcium and magnesium: 0.5 mole/dm³ of Zn, 0.45 mole/dm³ of Ca and 0.43 mole/dm³ of Mg. More complete saturation of ionite with zinc is also confirmed by difference of initial amount of ionite and amount of ionite at the moment of sorption equilibrium. The rate of process in dilute solutions is defined by outside diffusion. Change of ionic form of resin in the Na⁺ – Ca²⁺ – H⁺ range leads to the decreasing of equilibrium capacity of ampholyte from 0.343 to 0.217 mmole/cm³ and decreasing of rate constant from 0.178·10^–3 to 0.117·10^–3 sec^–1, which is connected with significant compete influence of hydrogen and calcium ions during the zinc absorption. During the simultaneous presence of cations in solution, ionite is saturated by calcium, whereupon calcium is removed by zinc. There is defined the highest selectivity of ionite, according to zinc cations, which shows the prospective application of Lewatit TP 207 resin for selective extraction of zinc from multicomponent solutions, containing hardness ions.

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