Treatment of wastewater resulting from iron ore beneficiation

The overall objective of this article is to study the potential of the reagent treatment of wastewater resulting from the iron ore beneficiation process, as well as preventing the discharge of the wastewater into the open waters. The wastewater at the Mikhailovskii iron ore beneficiation plant (Kursk Region, Russia) discharged into a tailings pond has become an object of the research. This article looks at the sedimentation kinetics of the wastewater resulting from the wet magnetic separation of iron ores. The results of the kinetic studies allow one to predict the efficiency of water clarification and the necessary duration of sedimentation of the recycled water of the iron ore processing plant in sedimentation facilities. It has been experimentally shown that the wastewater resulting from iron ore beneficiation plants contains kinetically stable suspended substances with a hydraulic size of less than 0.013 mm/s. The efficiency and time of wastewater clarification through the reagentless sedimentation depends on the hydraulic size of the suspended solids and the depth of the settling zone. The analysis proves the efficiency of an advanced wastewater treatment, which entails reagent sedimentation with the use of aluminum polyoxychloride AquaAurat 18 and flocculant Praestol 853. This approach helps to obtain the required quality of water for discharge into open reservoirs and to reduce the concentration of suspended solids by 99.6 % and total dissolved solids by 30 %. The preferable reagents dose, their ratio, as well as the method of the advanced wastewater treatment are determined.