Hazardous zinc refinery residues that contain Ag and Hg are a typical complex material obtained from zinc oxygen pressure leaching and currently there are few economically viable methods for disposal or reuse. The research presented here offers an effective approach for the comprehensive recovery of Zn, Fe, Cu, Ag and Hg from this highly toxic waste. During the initial hot-acid leaching stage, leaching efficiencies of 96.3% Zn, 96.0% Fe and 97.5% Cu were obtained, whereas the leaching of Ag and Hg were less than 0.2%. This resulted in the simultaneous separation of Zn, Fe and Cu and the enrichment of Ag and Hg ca. 300%. Subsequently, the leaching residues obtained from hot-acid leaching was further leached using acidic thiourea solution (pH = 1). The results of this second leaching step showed the almost 93% of Ag and 98% of Hg could be extracted using 20 g/L thiourea and 4 g/L Fe 3+ , with a L/S ratio of 8 and a temperature of 40 °C for 2 hours. The residue after thiourea leaching could be used as raw material in lead smelting. In the next step based on zinc powder cementation, the recovery of Ag and Hg both reached 99.0% and the cementation residue comprised of 53.1 wt. % Ag and 11.7 wt. % Hg. The main phases present included Ag, Hg3Ag2 and Ag2S and these can be further treated by vacuum distillation in order to separate Hg from Ag. These findings demonstrate that high recoveries of Zn, Fe, Cu, Ag and Hg from the toxic waste could be achieved with stepwise leaching followed by zinc powder cementation. This treatment protocol for toxic zinc refinery residues not only avoids the potential harm to the environment but also significantly improves the economics of the process.

Rare earth carbonates play a significant role in preparing rare earth oxides. This study examines the structure and composition of amorphous dysprosium carbonate (ADC) precursors produced through chemical precipitation. Next, how the amorphous phase changed throughout the hydrothermal process is analyzed. The precursor is identified as the Dy2(CO3)3·xH2O with spherical morphology (40 nm), as characterized by TEM, XRD, TG-MS, and FT-IR. It was found that ADC will undergo numerous morphological and structural transformations with the progress of the hydrothermal treatment. First, a metastable Dy2(CO3)3·xH2O is formed, and then a stable crystalline basic dysprosium carbonate Dy(OH)CO3 is obtained. The self-assembly of amorphous precursor units results in 1D and 3D structures according to the theory of negative ion coordination. The transformation mechanism of dysprosium carbonate follows Ostwald’s rule of stages, where the metastable phase dissolves and recrystallizes to form the stable basic dysprosium carbonate phase.

No abstract