REMOVAL OF IRON FROM QUARTZ ORE USING DIFFERENT ACIDS: A LABORATORY-SCALE REACTOR STUDY

The purification of quartz using chemical processes is extremely important for many industries, including the glass, electronic, detergent, ceramics, paint, refractory, and metallurgy industries, as well as for advanced technology products. The purpose of this work was to investigate the removal of iron as an impurity from quartz ores using a chemical leaching method with different reagents. The iron content of the quartz ore sample was 310ppm, and the iron was in the form of Fe2O3. In the first step, pre-enrichment studies were conducted based on the particle size, and the Fe2O3 content of the quartz ore was decreased to 88ppm. A statistical design of the experiments and an ANOVA (analysis of variance) were performed in the second step to determine the main effects and interactions of the researched factors, which were the concentration of the leaching reagent (H2SO4, HCl, H3PO4, HClO4, and NTA [Nitrilotriacetic acid]), solid/liquid ratio, leaching temperature, and leaching time. The highest Fe2O3 removal was 86.6%, and a 11.8ppm Fe2O3 content quartz product with a whiteness index (WI) value of 90.6 was obtained after 120min of treatment at 90 degrees C with a 10% S/L ratio and 1M H2SO4.