Metallurgical process
The metallurgical process is divided in 3 different ways:
Pyrometallurgy is a branch of extractive metallurgy. It consists of the thermal treatment of minerals and metallurgical ores and concentrates to bring about physical and chemical transformations in the materials to enable recovery of valuable metals. Pyrometallurgical treatment may produce products able to be sold such as pure metals, or intermediate compounds or alloys, suitable as feed for further processing. Examples of elements extracted by pyrometallurgical processes include the oxides of less reactive elements like iron, copper, zinc, chromium, tin, and manganese. Link: [Pyrometallurgy]
Hydrometallurgy is a technique within the field of extractive metallurgy, the obtaining of metals from their ores. Hydrometallurgy involve the use of aqueous solutions for the recovery of metals from ores, concentrates, and recycled or residual materials. Processing techniques that complement hydrometallurgy are pyrometallurgy, vapour metallurgy, and molten salt electrometallurgy. Link: [Hydrometallurgy]
Electrometallurgy is a method that uses electrical energy to produce metals by electrolysis. Electrometallurgy is usually the last stage in metal production and is therefore preceded by pyrometallurgical or hydrometallurgical operations. The electrolysis can be done on a molten metal oxide (smelt electrolysis) which is used for example to produce aluminium.
Link: [Electrometallurgy]
Picture: Pyrometallurgy process
Trade off in recycling
Metal can theoretically be recycled again and again without degrading their properties. The quality of grade «G» of a metal is a measure of purity of the product. It describes in which way or method the different metals will be prepared and recycled. For the different «G’s» are different ways. There is an inverse relationship or a trade-off between the quality of the material recovered and the amount of material required for the purification or metallurgical processes. link: [Trade off in recycling]
Vocabulary:
intermediate compounds - Zwischenverbindungen
obtaining - erhalten
preceded - vorausgegangen
Quiz: [link]
Silvan & Luana