Ausmelt/Isasmelt Matte Smelting

• Originally known as Sirosmelt (from CSIRO-

Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research
Organisation), the Au(Australia)smelt and Isa (after
Mt. Isa Mining company, Australia) are both
Australian technologies developed in the 1970s to
solve the problems associated with flash smelting
technologies.
• The fines used in flash furnaces result in generation
of dust due to lower settling velocities.
• Thus large settling areas are mandatory for flash
furnaces which increase reactor size and costs.
• use of top-lancing technology in Ausmelt and
Isasmelt furnaces was done to solve this problem
by producing lower cost furnaces.
• The technology is similar but they are marketed
under different names.
• Combined, they now account for more than 20%
of total blister copper production.
• Moist solid feed is dropped into a tall cylindrical
furnace while blowing O2-enriched air through a
vertical lance into the furnace’s matte/slag bath.
• This technology is also known as Top Submerged
Lance (TSL).
• Feed material comprises of moist concentrates,
flux and recycle materials,
sometimes pelletized.
• Drying of the feed is not necessary because the
smelting reactions take place in the matte/slag
bath rather than above it and also to suppress
dust.
• O2 enrichment of the blast is done to 50-60 % Vol.
Above this level excessive lance wear is
experienced.
• Most of the heat is generated by oxidation, but
because of
– (i) this upper limit on O2, enrichment and
– (ii) the presence of moisture in the solid feed,
• full autothermal operation is usually not
achieved.
• Instead, hydrocarbon fuel (natural gas, oil and
coal) is added.
• The furnace is a vertically aligned steel barrel,
~3.5m in diameter and ~12 m high. Capacity
up to 3000 tonnes of concentrate per day. It is
lined inside with chrome-magnesite
refractory.
• The lance tip is cooled by swirling the enriched air
'blast' in the annulus between the pipes.
• The swirled gas extracts heat from the outside pipe
and causes a protective slag layer to freeze on the
pipe surfaces.
• But still with that protective cooling, the lance is
replace almost every week.
• The used lances are refurbished for re-use by
welding a new 1 m section of outside pipe to the
bottom tip.
• Lance wear is minimized by avoiding excessive
immersion and %O2-in-blast.
• Technology different from flash smelting in
that the smelting reactions take place
primarily in the bath rather than above the
melt.
• As a result, the reaction sequence is different.
• It is believed that dissolved magnetite in the slag
serves as a catalyst for the reactions.
• As a result, the presence of about 5% magnetite
in the slag is important.
• This requires a low bath temperature (1 150-
1200°C) and low Si:Fe ratio (0.7-0.8 for Isasmelt,
0.6-0.7 for Ausmelt).
• Impurity elimination into slag and offgas during
smelting can be as high as: 91% As, 85% Cd, 75%
Bi, 68% Zn, 60% Sb, 60% Tl, 45% Pb, and 30% Te.
• Elimination of As, Bi, Pb, and Sb is encouraged by
decreasing oxygen enrichment
• Off-gas solids are recycled to the smelting
furnace for Cu recovery, so they are not
usually an escape route for impurities.
• The matte/slag mixture is tapped periodically
into a fuel-fired or electric setting furnace for
separation.
• The settled matte (~60% Cu) is sent to
conventional converting.
• The slag (0.70% Cu) is discarded.
• The offgas (25% SO2) is drawn from the top of
the smelting furnace through a vertical flue.
• A small amount of oxygen is blown through the
side of the smelting furnace or lance (about
halfway up) to ensure that sulfur leaves the
furnace as SO2 rather than S2.
• This prevents sulfur condensation in the gas
cleaning system.