Smelting Studies for Recovery of Iron

from Red Mud

Ender Keskinkilic, Saeid Pournaderi, Ahmet Geveci

and Yavuz A. Topkaya

Abstract Red mud can be regarded as a by-product of aluminium extraction

process since it contains a significant amount of iron and some valuable elements.
Therefore, the treatment of red mud has been a hot topic for some decades. The
authors have recently started a laboratory-scale project dealing with stepwise re-
covery of valuable elements from red mud of Seydisehir Aluminum Plant, Turkey.
The first step is related to recovery of iron and pyrometallurgical methods (smelting
and solid-state reduction) will be performed. Nonferrous metals will then be
selectively leached in the second step. In the extent of the present work, a literature
review relevant to the smelting studies for recovery of iron from red mud was
presented.

Keywords Red mud
Pyrometallurgy
Smelting
Iron

Introduction

Red mud is also called as bauxite residue, which is the waste material and more
correctly by-product obtained from Bayer process for alumina production. The
amount of red mud is at least equal to the amount of alumina produced, and most of
the time, it is significantly more [1]. World bauxite residue production is more than
70 Mt annually [2]. Therefore, a huge amount of material is being accumulated
continuously near the aluminium production plants, causing allocation of

E. Keskinkilic (&)
Department of Metallurgical and Materials Engineering,
Atilim University, 06830 Ankara, Turkey
e-mail: ender.keskinkilic@atilim.edu.tr
S. Pournaderi
Agri Ibrahim Cecen University, Ataturk Mah, 04500 Patnos, Agri, Turkey
A. Geveci
Y. A. Topkaya
Department of Metallurgical and Materials Eng, Middle East Technical University,
06531 Ankara, Turkey

© The Minerals, Metals & Materials Society 2019 489

T. Jiang et al. (eds.), 10th International Symposium on High-Temperature
Metallurgical Processing, The Minerals, Metals & Materials Series,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-05955-2_46
490 E. Keskinkilic et al.

substantially large area for disposal and more importantly environmental issues
related to toxicity of bauxite residue [3]. As well as their amounts in red mud are
concerned, iron oxide and aluminum oxide are the two primary components, so
efforts have been made to recover iron and aluminum from red mud for more than
fifty years [4]. Red mud has also been regarded as a source for recovery of certain
elements, such as rare-earth elements (REEs). A typical bauxite residue may con-
tain the following phases like hematite, goethite, gibbsite, diaspore, calcite and
cancrinite. [5].
Recovery of iron from red mud is important for two respects: first, iron oxide is
the major oxide component, source of iron, although it is not as high as the one
appearing in economical iron ores. Second, removal of iron from bauxite residue is
helpful to increase the recoveries of the elements in leaching step. Leaching without
prior iron removal results in significant iron dissolution, which badly affects the
leaching performance of REEs to be recovered [5]. There are many studies related
to either the first and/or the second target. Both studies can be classified mainly in
three categories: (a) solid-state reduction, (b) magnetic separation and (c) smelting.
The use of red mud in iron and steelmaking was one of the older smelting
examples for iron recovery [6]. Mozharenko and Noskov proposed the use of red
mud as a charge material to blast furnaces [7]. On the other hand, the direct use of
bauxite residue in blast furnaces causes a significant decrease in refractory life due
to its high alkaline content [8]. High alumina content of red mud increases viscosity
of blast furnace slag, so this cannot be tolerated for successful furnace operation.
Even after smelting of red mud for pig iron production, the slag’s alkali compo-
sition and higher viscosity of slag remain big problems for the vessel where
smelting is conducted. To overcome the problem associated with high viscosity,
great amount of CaO-containing fluxes (lime or limestone) are to be used to
increase CaO/SiO2 ratio from the values less than unity to nearly two [2]. Therefore,
high slag volume and alkali problem are the two bottlenecks of smelting operations.
High variability of red mud compositions from plant to plant also prevents the
establishment of a well-defined red mud smelting process [9]. Due to those factors,
smelting part of red mud treatment still has important problems to be solved for
successful industrial operation.
The authors have recently started a laboratory-scale project dealing with step-
wise recovery of valuable elements from red mud of Seydisehir Aluminum Plant,
Turkey. The first step in the project is related to recovery of iron and pyrometal-
lurgical methods (smelting and solid-state reduction) will be performed. Nonferrous
metals will then be selectively leached in the second step. In the extent of this work,
smelting studies for recovery of iron from red mud were presented. The investi-
gations dealing with solid-state reduction and magnetic separation are outside the
scope of this paper.
Smelting Studies for Recovery of Iron from Red Mud 491

Smelting Studies for Recovery of Iron

Smelting studies for recovery of iron from red mud was dating back to the end of
sixties and much was performed at the beginning of seventies. In one of these
studies, electric arc furnace (EAF) smelting of Jamaican and Surinam red mud were
performed for production of iron and alumina [10]. The major components of
Jamaican and Surinam red mud are shown in Table 1.
Pellets made up of red mud and ground limestone were charged to EAF together
with the coke. After complete melting, the bath temperature was increased
to *1500 °C, and then the furnace was shut down after about 15 min. After
cooling of around one day, pig iron and slag were removed from the furnace. The
slag was then subjected to leaching with Na2CO3 to obtain soluble sodium alu-
minate. After a number of tests conducted with both Jamaican and Surinam red
mud, it was found that iron recoveries could reach 98% and alumina recoveries of
84% could be obtained. Slightly better iron recoveries were reported for Jamaican
red mud [10].
It was outlined in a paper dealing with metal recovery from scrap and waste that
in 1971, Mc Dowell-Willman Engineering Co. developed a process for the smelting
of prereduced red mud pellets in EAF to obtain pig iron followed by LD converter
process to produce steel. It was reported that it could be an alternative way for steel
production for the countries where there are significant number of aluminum plants
but no integrated iron and steelmaking industry [1]. Other than soda–lime–carbon
sinter process investigated by Fursman et al. [10], complex separation–melting
process (Hungary) and smelting–slag disintegration process (Yugoslavia) were the
pilot plant studies conducted in the past [11]. It was indicated in the literature that
ROMELT process [12] established for iron making by Moscow Institute of Steel
and Alloys (MISA) was considered by Indian companies NALCO and RSIL to
smelt bauxite residue [13]. In relation to the smelting of red mud, patents can easily
be found in the literature, so some examples are presented in the references for the
reader’s attention [14–16].
Kauben and Friedrich [8] outlined the pig iron compositions obtained by
Logomerac [17] and Ziegenbalg [18] in the red mud smelting experiments per-
formed in EAF using red mud as a charge material (Table 2). As it can be seen from
these literature data, it seems that the variabilities of elements in pig iron are very
high.
Kumar et al. reviewed the innovative methodologies for the utilisation of blast
furnace slag, red mud and fly ash. In the scope of that work, it was outlined that

Table 1 Chemical composition of Jamaican and Surinam red mud [10]

Material Al2O3 SiO2 TiO2 Fe2O3 Na2O CaO
Jamaican red mud 14.6 3.40 6.87 50.9 3.18 4.96
Surinam red mud 19.0 11.9 12.15 24.81 9.29 3.6
492 E. Keskinkilic et al.

Table 2 Pig iron Element (wt%) Logomerac [17] Ziegenbalg [18]

compositions in EAF smelting
tests from the literature [8] C 3.8–4.5 4.2–5
Si 0.5–3 0.3–0.6
Ti 0.1–0.3 0.2–0.7
Cr 0.2–0.4 –

Thakur and Das [6] smelted red mud in EAF with the presence of coke at 1600–
1700 °C and that iron alloy having recoveries of 90% was obtained. It was further
indicated that slag was subjected to leaching with sulphuric acid to recover iron
oxide and titanium dioxide [11].
Kauben and Friedrich [8] studied reductive smelting of red mud for iron re-
covery using laboratory-scale EAF. The average composition of red mud is given in
Table 3. In each run, approximately 200 g of lignite coke was smelted together with
3200 g of red mud in dried condition. Temperature of the EAF was reported in the
range of 1600–1700 °C. It was found that commercial pig iron having composition
of *4 wt% carbon, less than 0.5 wt% silicon and 0.2 wt% titanium could be
obtained. The authors also discussed the alkali problem created by the presence of
Na2O. The boiling temperature of metallic sodium is fairly low (897 °C) compared
to smelting temperatures. Therefore, a significant amount of sodium vapour formed
during reduction of Na2O with solid carbon. It was indicated that sodium vapour
then showed reoxidation in the off-gas chamber [19]. It was reported that total alkali
content after reduction was below 0.1 wt% [18].
Balomenos et al. targeted a zero-waste process using EAF technology. Greek red
mud having composition of 16.22 wt% Al2O3, 47.74 wt% Fe2O3, 10.73 wt% CaO,
6.08 wt% SiO2, 5.93 wt% TiO2 and 2.51 wt% Na2O was smelted in a dust treating
EAF to obtain pig iron and viscous slag. Pig iron was reported to contain 93.206 wt
% Fe, 4.802 wt% C, 0.737 wt% Si and 0.566 wt% Ti. CaO, Al2O3, SiO2 and TiO2
were reported as the major components of the viscous slag. As a part of ENEXAL
project, the viscous slag was subjected to high-speed air/water jet and therefore
fiberized aiming to be used as mineral wool. Insulating mineral wool necessitates
lower radioactive content, so the authors had to use at least 220 kg of fluxes per ton
of red mud to decrease the parameter related to radioactivity called as “activity
concentration index, I” below 6. Actually, one and a half time greater amount of
fluxes were added to achieve the desired CaO/SiO2 ratio, in the range of 0.8–1 [20].
More detail about fiberization tests were published in another paper. According to
SEM analysis results, inorganic fibres having diameter 20 lm were obtained and
some thicker fibres were also reported. The authors indicated that commercial

Table 3 Average composition of red mud used in EAF smelting experiments [8]
Component (wt%) Fe2O3 Al2O3 SiO2 TiO2 Na2O CaO
Red mud 30–50 10–20 5–20 3–15 3–7 1–8
Smelting Studies for Recovery of Iron from Red Mud 493

vitreous wool products have diameters in the range of 3–10 lm. The authors
concluded that uniform fibres could be produced from slag melts by melt blowing
or melt spinning [21].
Ercag and Apak investigated smelting of Turkish bauxite residue from
Seydisehir to obtain pig iron and slag, which was then leached to recover TiO2 and
Al2O3. Average composition of red mud from Seydisehir Aluminum Plant is shown
in Table 4 [22]. With the addition of bentonite, 100 g red of red mud, 100 g of
dolomitic limestone and 16.16 g of coke were pelletized and sintered in an ash
furnace at 1100 °C for 1 h. Afterwards, the pellets were placed in a graphite cru-
cible and charged to a high-temperature furnace heated from room temperature to
1550 °C and kept for 1 h at this temperature. The furnace was then cooled down
nearly one day. With magnetic separation, 11.89 g of pig iron was collected.
Chemical composition of pig iron was reported as 95.68 wt% Fe, 1.10 wt% Ti and
0.0066 wt% Al. The amount of slag was indicated as 100 g. Slag TiO2 and Fe2O3
compositions were measured as 1.25 wt% and 0.2776 wt%, respectively [23]. The
slag was then subjected to leaching and solvent extraction processes to obtain
Al2O3 and pigment-grade TiO2 [22].
Borra et al. studied smelting reduction of red mud for iron and subsequent REE’s
recovery. The chemical analysis of the bauxite residue used in that study is illus-
trated in Table 5. The red mud was mixed with calcium silicate (CaO: 51.2 wt%
and SiO2: 46.4 wt%), and graphite powder and handmade pellets were prepared.
After drying at 105 °C for one day, pellets were placed in a graphite crucible and
were heated to 1500–1600 °C in a high-temperature vertical alumina tube furnace
under argon atmosphere. The crucible waited at the set temperature for 1 h. It was
found that around 15 wt%, calcium silicates in the furnace charge were sufficient to
form a liquid slag at 1500 °C. Smelting at 1600 °C was not found as suitable due to
the increased reaction of sample and graphite crucible. The authors reported that for
a clear-cut metal–slag separation, the amount of calcium silicate in the charge
should be at least 20 wt%. Excess carbon practice was not successful and the
optimum graphite amount was determined as 5 wt%, which corresponded to stoi-
chiometric carbon requirement for reduction of Fe2O3. Impurities present in the pig
iron were reported as C: 5.1 wt%, Si: 0.19 wt%, Ti: 0.33 wt%, P: 0.12 wt% and S:
0.004 wt%. Recovery of iron was found to be larger than 85%. The remaining of
the work was dedicated to leaching experiments using the slag obtained from
smelting, and the recoveries of REEs were discussed deeply [5].
Ning et al. targeted to smelt the red mud to obtain pig iron and slag, which was
aimed to be used in steelmaking as a desulfurization flux. The chemical compo-
sition of the red mud used in smelting experiments is shown in Table 6. Pellets
were formed with the addition of coke powder, and the reduction roasting

Table 4 Average composition of red mud obtained from Seydisehir Aluminum Plant [22]
Component Fe2O3 Al2O3 SiO2 TiO2 Na2O CaO CO2 P2O5 S V2O5 LOI
(wt%)
Red mud 37.6 19.1 15.7 4.9 9.5 2.4 1.8 0.18 0.07 0.045 7.8
±0.3 ±0.5 ±0.2 ±0.1 ±0.5 ±0.3 ±0.4 ±0.1 ±0.005 ±0.001 ±0.2
494 E. Keskinkilic et al.

Table 5 Chemical composition of the bauxite residue used in the smelting experiments [5]
Component Fe2O3 Al2O3 SiO2 TiO2 Na2O CaO Major rare-earth elements
(wt%) Ce (g/ton) La (g/ton) Sc (g/ton)
Red mud 44.6 23.6 10.2 5.7 2.5 11.2 368 114 121

experiments were conducted in a vertical tube furnace at 1100–1200 °C for 12–

20 min. For smelting reduction experiments, CaO–Al2O3–SiO2 slag system (Fig. 1
[24]) was selected as a basis and charges were prepared with the addition of CaO
and Al2O3 to obtain slag compositions in the region of the lowest melting tem-
perature compound, 12CaO.7Al2O3. All materials were thoroughly mixed and
placed into a graphite crucible, which was charged into a horizontal tube furnace at
1550 °C and the crucible was remained in the furnace for 40 min under argon
atmosphere. Afterwards, the furnace was cooled down slowly, and pig iron and slag
phases were removed from the furnace for chemical analysis. The typical compo-
sition of the metal was reported as (i.e. one of the experiments) 5.34 wt% C,
0.016 wt% S, 0.16 wt% P and 0.013 wt% Si. The composition of the major
components of the slag was given as 53.89 wt% CaO, 35.74 wt% Al2O3, 4.57 wt%
SiO2, 3.62 wt% TiO2 and 1.41 wt% Na2O [25]. As well as CaO, Al2O3 and SiO2
components of the slag are concerned; the composition is similar to the ladle
furnace slags in secondary steelmaking (Table 7 [26]). As it can be seen from
Table 7, very small amount of Na2O is present in ladle furnace slags. On the other
hand, Na2O present in the red mud was also transferred to the slag phase during red
mud smelting. There are a number of laboratory studies showing good desulfur-
ization ability of Na2O slags, and some examples are given in the references [27–
30]. Moreover, the use of Na2CO3 for desulfurization of hot metal was studied, in
detail [31, 32]. On the other hand, the use of alkali-containing agents in hot metal
desulfurization or in ladle metallurgy reduces the life of the refractories due to its
corrosive nature, so it is not industrially preferred. In a study related to hot metal
desulfurization, Turkdogan pointed out that due to the corrosive nature of Na2O
containing slags formed during desulfurization by Na2CO3, refractory wear in the
process is tremendous. Gaseous reaction products lead to environmental problems.
Moreover, as the amount of Na2O decreases by time, the possibility of sulphur
going back to metal phase increases. It was indicated that it was crucial to take
desulfurization slag away from metal as quickly as possible [33].
Rath et al. investigated the use of plasma arc technology to recover iron from red
mud. Fine red mud of the following composition was used in the smelting

Table 6 Chemical composition of the red mud used in the smelting experiments [25]
Component (wt%) Fe2O3 Al2O3 SiO2 TiO2 Na2O CaO MgO K2O LOI
Red mud 67.01 7.90 5.01 3.92 1.725 0.35 0.09 0.078 13.24
Smelting Studies for Recovery of Iron from Red Mud 495

Fig. 1 CaO–Al2O3–SiO2 ternary phase diagram [24]

experiments: 55.2 wt% Fe2O3, 16.5 wt% Al2O3, 6.3 wt% SiO2, 3.1 wt% Na2O,
1.4 wt% CaO, 4.5 wt% TiO2, 0.1 wt% S, 0.08 wt% P and 12.5 wt% LOI. After
drying at 383 K, red mud was mixed with graphite and certain fluxes including
limestone, dolomite and fluorspar. The batches were adjusted in such a way that
350 g of dried red mud was charged in each run. The charge materials fed into a
graphite crucible were smelted in a plasma arc furnace for periods of 5–18 min
under argon atmosphere. The authors studied the variation of metal recovery with
time, reductant amount and basicity. It was reported that metal recovery increased
up to 15 min, whereas it showed a decrease beyond this point. It was indicated that
this decrease might be attributed to the formation of complex compounds at ele-
vated temperatures. The amount of reductant in the batches was in the range of 9–
14 wt%, and it was found that metal recovery decreased beyond 11 wt%. It was
further reported that metal recovery showed a decreasing trend beyond the basicity
value of 0.25. Moreover, increased amount of reductant and basicity resulted in an
increase in power consumption. Furthermore, the authors dealt with the kinetics of
the process upon investigation of metal recovery and found that the reduction
reaction followed the first-order kinetics, surface diffusion being the rate controlling
 496

Table 7 Chemical composition of ladle furnace slags of a low-carbon steel grade (all the samples were taken just at the end of ladle furnace operations) [26]
Heat# FetO SiO2 MnO Al2O3 CaO MgO P2O5 S Na2O K2O TiO2 Cr2O3
1 1.95 6.33 2.77 30.99 49.50 8.11 0.0010 0.074 0.128 0.0145 0.138 0.002
2 2.19 6.58 3.02 31.93 48.71 7.34 0.0010 0.054 0.045 0.0010 0.106 0.015
3 1.86 7.40 2.43 30.13 49.34 8.54 0.0009 0.064 0.093 0.0063 0.137 0.001
4 1.84 4.50 1.54 26.41 56.29 9.14 0.0135 0.108 0.052 0.0103 0.099 0.001
5 1.05 2.29 0.31 33.99 53.36 8.54 0.0009 0.424 0.017 0.0009 0.031 0.001
E. Keskinkilic et al.
Smelting Studies for Recovery of Iron from Red Mud 497

step. Multi-linear regression analysis (MLRA) was also conducted considering the
four factors, namely effect of red mud, energy efficiency, effect of basicity and
effect of flux. It was concluded that those four components accounted for 75.4% of
the variation. Faster reaction time, handling of fine red mud particles without the
necessity of agglomeration and CO formation at high temperatures were indicated
as the main advantages of plasma arc process [34]. Statistical modelling of iron
recovery from red mud was studied in another paper [35].

Conclusions

Since the end of the sixties, smelting of red mud has been deeply investigated for
recovery of iron and/or enhancement of subsequent leaching recoveries of alu-
minium and other elements including the rare earths. In relation to smelting studies,
the following main conclusions can be drawn:
• High variation of red mud compositions from plant to plant prevents estab-
lishment of well-defined smelting process. Those variations also cause high
variability in pig iron compositions.
• Smelting experiments conducted using industrial furnaces and pilot or
laboratory-scale works all necessitate the use of significant amount of
CaO-containing fluxes to form a suitable slag, causing an increase in slag
volume. The presence of Na2O in red mud not only leads to evaporation/
reoxidation of sodium, but also decreases the refractory life of the smelting
vessels.
• Plasma arc furnace is given as an example of new technologies. Some smelting
investigations suggested zero-waste processes in such a way that smelting slags
were used for mineral wool production and evaluated as a flux material, e.g.
desulphurization flux. Although some drawbacks are seemingly present in them,
those can be regarded as promising attempts for the treatment of red mud.

Acknowledgements The authors would like to thank The Scientific and Technological Research
Council of Turkey (TUBITAK) for the financial support given under Project No: 117M185.

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