THE KIDD-CREEK COPPER SMELTER - AN UPDATE ON PLANT PERFORMANCE

The Kidd Creek copper smelter started operation in June 1981 using the Mitsubishi Continuous Smelting Process. A steady increase in plant production rates has been demonstrated, and the annual tonnage of concentrate smelted is now double the original design rate. This paper summarizes recent modifications made to increase concentrate feedrates, increase on-line time, reduce copper losses and control the impurity level in anode copper. It includes improvements made to furnace design, improvements to reduce downtime for boiler cleaning, and improvements made to the acid plant to allow handling of increased gas flowrates and higher gas strengths while maintaining low acid plant emission rates.