Flotation of Sulphide Ores - HZL Experience

Abstract

Flotation process, patented in the year 1906, was origin-ally developed for mineral industry to recover values from high grade tailings of gravity seperation plants. This technology has acclaimed importance as a versatile process for the beneficiation of vast variety of sulphide mine-rals. Due to flexibility of the process and remarkable development taken place in flotation technology and its ancillary systems, it has now become possible to recover fine grained sulphide minerals from compiled ore deposits, whose processing was earlier considered un-economical. Today, about 400 million tonnes of sulphide ore is treated annually by flotation process worldwide. M/s Hindustan Zinc Ltd. (HZL), a leading lead-zinc mining and smelting company in India has experienced a spect- acular growth from the time of its inception. Starting from a single 500 MT per day lead-zinc mine at Zawar, HZL has expanded its mining capacity to about 13,000 MT per day with matching ore beneficiation plants, all adopting froth flotation technology.