STUDY ON THE SEPAEATION OF A BINARY METAL MIXTURE BY SOLVENT EXTRACTION

A study on the extraction of copper and zinc from aqueous binary metal solutions with terdodecylthioglycolic acid in kerosene has been realized. Distribution of the metal ions in a wide range of pH and carboxylic acid concentrations has been studied.The results show that an interaction occurs which influences the amount of each metal extracted, so that a mixed metal complex is formed in the organic phase, in addition to pure metal complexes and . The separation factor for copper and zinc has been expressed as a function of the species concentrations and the extraction constants involved. From these results, the extractant is shown to be moderately adequate for separation of copper and zinc.