Combining sulfate electrowinning with chloride leaching

Although the chloride leaching of copper sulfide concentrates has proved highly efficient, electrowinning from chloride solutions presents many difficulties, notably in cell design and the handling of the powder product. Sulfate electrowinning,on the other hand, continues to improve and has played a significant part in the widespread adoption of the solvent extraction-electrowinning process for copper recovery from low-grade ores. It has been found that the two steps can be combined by introducing a novel solvent extraction process after chloride leaching. This article presents the results of laboratory tests to prove the feasibility of this approach and discusses how it can be integrated into a commercially viable flow sheet.