Copper ore. Epoch in the history of mankind

One of the first metals with which he learnedwork man, was copper, or in Latin Cuprum (Cu). It is simply impossible to exaggerate its role in the development of human civilization: an entire epoch in history was called the "Bronze Age" (bronze is an alloy of tin and copper). Receive this beautiful and malleable metal (copper color - golden pink) learned before our era. The words "bornite", "chalcopyrite", "chalcosine", "covelin", "enargite", "cuprite" sound like the names of something unusual, although in fact some of the copper-bearing ores are called so. The source of this metal was copper ore.

In nature, Cuprum can be both in the formnuggets, and the form of connections. There are several different types of copper ore, which can be divided into sulphide, oxidized and mixed by composition. Usually copper ore is complex, it contains many other elements and compounds - lead, zinc, nickel sulfide and other elements. In addition, it contains scattered elements - selenium, tellurium, cadmium, indium and the like. At the cost of these metals are not less than 50% of the Cuprum, extracted from the breed.

The most commonly used sulphide ores,including Cu-sulfur compounds. The very production of copper consists of several independent stages. The main way to get it is pyrometallurgical.

Usually copper ore contains insignificantthe amount of Cuprum, so the rock is preliminarily enriched. To do this, it is crushed, mixed with water and some special substances, and then placed in a flotation machine. There all this is mixed, the particles of sulphides rise to the surface in the form of foam and are carried away, and the empty rock settles to the bottom.

The next stage of processing, which passescopper ore, is called "smelting on matte." Sand is added to the concentrate obtained and the mixture is heated to the melting point of the metal. With this action, sulfur is oxidized to sulfur oxide, and the molten metal is collected at the bottom of the furnace. This melt is poured into the converter and purged with air. As a result, the oxidation of sulfur produces metallic copper, which is poured into molds. When cooling such ingots (in them the content of Cu reaches 98%), sulfur dioxide is released. It is captured and then used as a raw material for the production of sulfuric acid.

To obtain the metal of the required purity, the blackcopper must be refined. It can be of two types - fire or electrolytic. When refining, it is also possible to obtain the noble metals contained in the resulting blister copper.

Fire refining is carried out in special furnaces, electrolysis is carried out in baths lined with lead or viniplast.

For fire refining, the resulting blankloaded into an oven and melted. Then the air is blown through the liquid metal. During oxidation, some of the impurities pass into the slag, while the other sublimes and is carried away with the furnace gases. Oxidates also Cuprum. All noble metals remain in the melt. The reduction of oxidized copper occurs when it interacts with carbon, the source of which is gas, a vapor-oil mixture, etc. This operation has been called copper deformation. Moreover, Cu is reduced by the carbon of wood. Then there is casting into ingots or special anode slabs for electrolysis refining.

Electrolysis refining is resorted toThe case where copper is intended for use in the electrical industry, or when it contains a large number of precious metals (silver, gold, platinum).

During electrolysis, the bath is filled with electrolyte,put in it as an anode refined copper, and as a cathode pure Cu, and pass through the bath current. As a result, pure metal is deposited on the cathode (purity - up to 99.95%).