Flash Smelting Analysis, Control and Optimization

Flash Smelting: Analysis, Control and Optimization deals with the analysis, control, and optimization of flash smelting. This book explores flash smelting in general and Outokumpu and Inco flash smelting in particular, and also presents a mathematical description for the flash smelting process. A set of mass and heat balance equations that can be used to describe steady state smelting under autogenous or nearautogenous smelting conditions is developed. This text has 20 chapters and begins with an overview of flash smelting and its products; the main raw materials of copper flash smelting; chemical reactions in the flash furnace; impurities in the concentrates that are fed to the flash furnace; and the operation of industrial flash furnaces. Attention then turns to Outokumpu flash smelting, Inço flash smelting, and mathematical representation of flash smelting. The chapters that follow focus on the effects of blast preheat on flash smelting; the combustion of fossil fuel in the flash furnace; and the effect of matte grade on the fossil fuel, industrial oxygen, and blast preheat requirements of flash smelting. Equations are used to determine the effects of such factors as concentrate composition, blast temperature, and dust carryout, and as the basis for optimizing and controlling the flash smelting process. This book will be of interest to both mathematicians and metallurgists.