Recovery of Nickel and Apatite from the Copper Ore of Indian Corpn Ghatsila

At the instance of Indian Copper Corporation, Ghatsila, beneficiation studies were carried out at National Metallurgical Laboratory with a view to improving the recovery of nickel over the current figure of about 30% and to find out whether apatite, currently lost in the tailings, Could also be recovered. These studies were carried out both with (1) the I.C.C. Tailing sample, assaying O.17% Cu, 07% Ni and 1.49 %P2O5, and (2) the I.C.C. copper ore, assaying 2.2% Cu, 0.08% Ni and 1.36% P2O5. Microscopic examination of the samples indicated that the present poor recovery of nickel in the copper flotation concentrate is due to incomplete liberation of the nickel-mineral at 44% -200 mesh. The test results indicated that nickel recovery could almost be doubled by increasing the flotation time to enable the relatively slow-floating locked nickel minerals to come up, or alternatively, by aiming at better liberation of the nickel-bearing minerals by grinding the ore to about 70% -200 mesh. About 84.9% of the total apatite currently lost in the tailings could easily be recovered by straight flotation of the tailing sample-