Overview of gold recovery from gold-containing anode slime

In fact, almost all of the silver, one-half or more platinum group metals and the amount of gold, as a byproduct of nonferrous metallurgy, with the main process of extracting the recovered metal. According to reports, since the 1970s, by-product gold accounted for about one-tenth of the world's gold production, including: the former Soviet Union accounts for about 20%, the United States accounts for about 35%, and China accounts for about 20%.

The most important source is colored heavy metal electrolytic anode slime. Because the standard potential of precious metals is positive (such as silver is +0.8V, gold +1.5V, platinum, palladium , ruthenium ), and is larger than copper (+0.34V), lead (-0.13V), tin (-0.14) V), nickel (-0.25V), zinc (-0.76V), etc., so when they are electrolyzed, they are enriched in the anode mud, especially gold, platinum, and palladium. In general, they are all substantially enriched in In the anode mud. They exist in a state and complexity. It is generally believed that gold is mainly composed of metals, silver, metals and selenium , tellurides , platinum, palladium, and amorphous intermetallic compounds, and nickel and copper alloys.

The anode mud composition fluctuates greatly. For copper anode mud, it generally contains 0.2% to 0.8% of gold, 8% to 24% of silver, and a large amount of copper, lead, selenium, tellurium and trace amounts of platinum and palladium. Lead anode mud generally contains 8% to 13% of silver, and gold is rarely (0.02% to 0.045%), and is substantially free of platinum group metals. The anode anode mud contains 3.37% gold, 9.96% copper, 26.72% lead, 33.40% bismuth, 4.40% nickel, and 0.70% As. Nickel anode mud generally contains low levels of gold and silver.

Pyrite cinder is an important source of gold. It is estimated that the annual world production of pyrite is about 30 million tons, and the residue after desulfurization generally contains 0.5 to 2 g/t of gold and 5 to 10 g/t of high. Zinc smelting kiln slag, silver zinc shell and wet copper slag are also sources of silver and a small amount of gold. Seawater is a huge potential resource for gold. It is estimated that the total reserves can reach 15 to 18 million tons, but the concentration is extremely low, which is still difficult to recycle.