Processing Gold Ore

Total technology solutions across the mining value chain

TENOVA is a worldwide supplier of advanced technologies, products and engineering services for the iron & steel and mining industries.

PROJECT SERVICES I Consulting: ore-body, production and market evaluation to assess project viability. I Test work supervision: Tenova Mining & Minerals engineers arrange and oversee laboratory, pilot plant and on-site test work. I In-house laboratory for cost-effective and prompt scoping work, as a basis for structuring project definitions. I Pre-feasibility and feasibility studies. I Technology supply packages: incorporating basic engineering design, process guarantees, proprietary equipment definition and supply, and commissioning support. I Process plant design and project management: all phases of the project, from inception through design and construction to commissioning, maximising the success and profitability of the venture. I Comprehensive spares and after-sales back-up. I Process audits to Best Practice guidelines and the Cyanide Code.

PROJECT FINANCE Tenova Mining & Minerals assists clients to structure, negotiate and secure optimal and cost-effective financial packages for projects of all sizes.

FLEXIBLE CONTRACT STRUCTURING I Reimbursable, fixed price or any combination to suit client needs. I Joint ventures on projects.

PROCESSING TECHNOLOGIES I For beneficiation of gold ore, Tenova Mining & Minerals liaises with suppliers and evaluates equipment to make unbiased selections of the best equipment for the job. I For stockpiling, materials handling, environmental protection and waste disposal, Tenova Mining & Minerals draws upon its comprehensive in-house and licensed range of engineered technologies or selects the most appropriate equipment from other suppliers.

Tenova Mining & Minerals is a total integrated solutions provider to the global mining, bulk materials handling and minerals beneficiation and processing sectors, offering innovative technological solutions and full process and commodity knowledge across the mining industry value chain.

Tenova Mining & Minerals range of services for gold ore processing covers all processes needed for the recovery of gold, from ore to bullion (dor) and fine gold, converting run-of-mine (ROM) ore into saleable products, integrating engineering and process know-how in development and optimisation of plant designs, and delivering processing facilities to global environmental standards.

ORE HANDLING AND PREPARATION Materials Handling Tenova Mining & Minerals designs and supplies complete materials handling systems. I Conveyor systems to move ore and tailings to, from and within the processing plant. I Stacking and reclaiming systems for efficient, effective and economic reclaiming of bulk materials. I Plants to process tailings and extract coarse material for use as backfill. Comminution Tenova Mining & Minerals selects and designs energyeffective and cost-effective systems for mechanical liberation and exposure of gold from all types of gold ores. I Fine crushing only (up to four stages), usually for heap leach applications. I Conventional crushing and milling. I Autogenous and semi-autogenous milling. Computer modelling of proposed comminution circuits maximises use of available data.

Pre-concentration Tenova Mining & Minerals designs effective pre-concentration processes that significantly reduce the size of a gold-recovery plant. I Flotation I Conventional mechanical and column flotation cells. I Dense-media separation (DMS) I Tenova Mining & Minerals DMS technology is applied highly successfully to gold ores, particularly for retreating waste rock. I Gravity concentration I Gravity-separation techniques including tables, jigs, centrifugal concentrators and sluices.

GOLD EXTRACTION Tenova Mining & Minerals provides leaching plants for all types of gold ores. Pretreatment of Refractory Ores Tenova Mining & Minerals has a depth of experience in refractory ore projects that is equal or superior to most of the other engineering companies. I Bacterial oxidation I Tenova Mining & Minerals applies all current technology, e.g. from Mintek and Bactech, as well as Gold Fields BIOX process. I Pressure oxidation I Tenova Mining & Minerals has successfully applied pressure oxidation for gold processing. I Roasting (including whole ore roasting) I Traditional roasting technology where acid recovery results in a saleable product. I Arsenic-stabilising technologies to minimise environmental pollution. I Emerging technologies I Thiosulphate leaching, Augment, the Albion process, resin-in-pulp, Activox and others. Tenova Mining & Minerals also accesses other proprietary technology for treating refractory ores and concentrates.

Leaching I Conventional cyanidation Using air agitated pachucas or high-efficiency mechanically-agitated vessels. I Thiosulphate leaching Alternative lixiviants to leaching, preg robbing and high copper-gold ores. I Heat leaching Simple and relatively low cost. I Carbon extraction processing I Tenova Mining & Minerals offers state-of-the-art expertise in Carbon-in-leach (CIL). Carbon-in-pulp (CIP). Carbon-in-column (CIC). I Plants incorporate industry standard technology for carbon-gold processing. Efficient mechanically-agitated adsorption vessels. Static-air or mechanically-swept interstage screens. Efficient desorption procedures.

GOLD METAL RECOVERY Tenova Mining & Minerals has considerable experience in designing all unit processes, such as electrorefining, acid digestion, calcining, smelting and slag treatment, needed to recover gold from clarified solutions to produce saleable metal. Recovery from Solution I Electrowinning I Tenova Mining & Minerals incorporates wellproven electrowinning cells in its process designs, such as the Zadra, AARL and Mintek cells. I These offer operation at high temperature and varying electrolyte strength. reduced gas-explosion hazard. no anodic-cyanide destruction. coherent gold deposition at higher current densities. minimal sensitivity to process disturbances. I Zinc precipitation I Tenova Mining & Minerals supplies Merill-Crowe plants for recovery of gold from cyanide leach liquors. I Carbon elution I Tenova Mining & Minerals carbon elution plants utilise AARL batch elution process. Zadra (pressure and atmospheric) process. AARL continuous elution process. I Tenova Mining & Minerals applies batch test work to optimise design of continuous processing plants of this type and computer models to predict performance of full scale plants. I A distribution agreement with Como Engineers Pty Ltd of Australia provides Tenova Mining & Minerals clients with access to its modular gold elution, carbon regeneration and refining plants.

GOLD REFINING Tenova Mining & Minerals supplies process design for plants to refine dor or bullion to pure (999.9 fineness) gold.

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION Cyanide Recovery and Destruction For environmentally-sensitive areas, Tenova Mining & Minerals supplies both proprietary and in-house technology for recovery or destruction of cyanide in gold process plants. This includes the licensed SXCN process developed by Placer Dome Technical Services. Dust and Air Pollution Control Dust control systems for furnaces, smelters, mills, conveyors, assay and chemical laboratories are designed and supplied by Tenova Mining & Minerals. A comprehensive range of scrubbers, bagfilters and cartridge filters is available.

MODULAR GOLD PLANTS Tenova Mining & Minerals Modular Plants for extraction and recovery of gold are trial erected and water commissioned at the fabricators premises and then partially dismantled and shipped as container-sized sections, for re-assembly and final commissioning on site. Each Tenova Mining & Minerals Modular Plant is customdesigned for a specific application. Additional modularised components can be incorporated later to increase plant throughput or to accommodate higher grades. Applications I Fast-track operations. I Hard-rock feedstocks. I Sites where construction is difficult, such as remote locations with adverse climatic or geographic conditions. I Relocation after economic reserves have been depleted. Comminution I Maximum plant capacity of about 1,000 t/day or 45 t/h of feed ore. I Multiple mills used for higher throughputs. I Conventional crushing and milling available, but rollermounted mills preferred for transportability and simplified site installation. Intensive Processing Pre-concentrating gold into a small volume of concentrate for intensive processing results in I More compact operation. I Minimised reagent exposure, containment and elimination. I Reduced leach times and circuits. I Possible direct gold recovery via electrowinning (EW), avoiding carbon adsorption, stripping and regeneration. Pre-concentration processes include flash and conventional flotation, Knelson / Falcon centrifugal concentrators and in-line pressure jigs during multistage gravity concentration.

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Leaching High-intensity cyanide leaching contactors treat the combined gravity and flotation concentrate, reducing leaching times to between 5 and 8 hours. Gold Recovery I Belt filtration with counter-current washing recovers gold and silver bearing filtrate. I Carbon or resin recovers gold and silver from filtrate. I With intensive leaching, direct EW of the filtrate virtually eliminates gold lockup in the carbon inventory and theft from batch-gravity devices. I Calcining the steel-wool cathodes and direct smelting produces gold / silver dor.

Waste Disposal Gold-depleted tailings are produced as a filter cake for disposal by dry stacking (for backfill) or pumping to a tailings dam. With proven detoxification techniques, cyanide in process plant tailings is reduced to less than 10 ppm of free cyanide, well within world environmental limits.

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Tenova Mining & Minerals Emerald Parkway Road Greenstone Hill, Ext 21 1609 PO Box 7737 Johannesburg 2000 South Africa Phone +27 11 899 9111 Fax +27 11 899 2302 enquiries.TMM@za.tenovagroup.com

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