Obtaining and production of metals from natural raw materials causes a large amount of liquid, solid, and gaseous wastes of various hazard classes that have a negative impact on the environment. In the production of titanium dioxide from ilmenite concentrate, hydrolytic sulphuric acid is formed, which includes various metal cations, their main part is iron (III) and titanium (IV) cations. Hydrolytic acid waste is sent to acid storage facilities, which have a high environmental load. The article describes the technology of ion exchange wastewater treatment of acid storage facility from iron (III) and titanium (IV) cations, which form compounds with sulphate ions and components of organic waste in acidic environments. These compounds are subjected to dispersion and dust loss during the evaporation of a water technogenic facility, especially in summer season. Sorption of complex iron (III) cations [FeSO4]+ and titanyl cations TiO2+ from sulphuric acid solutions on cation exchange resins KU-2-8, Puromet MTS9580, and Puromet MTS9560 was studied. Sorption isotherms were obtained both for individual [FeSO4]+ and TiO2+ cations and in the joint presence. The values of the equilibrium constants at a temperature of 298 K and the changes in the Gibbs energy are estimated. The capacitive characteristics of the sorbent were determined for individual cations and in the joint presence.
The issues of complex processing of mineral resources are relevant due to the depletion of available raw materials. So, it is necessary to involve technological waste, generated during the processing of raw materials, to obtain valuable components. In the process flow of apatite concentrate treatment using the sulfuric acid method, a large amount of phosphogypsum is produced with an average content of light rare earth metals (REMs) reaching 0.032-0.45 %. When phosphogypsum is treated with sulfuric acid solutions, a part of REMs is transferred to the sulfate solution, from which it can be extracted by means of ion exchange method. The study focuses on sorption recovery of light REMs (praseodymium, neodymium and samarium) in the form of anionic sulfate complexes of the composition [ln(SO 4 ) 2 ] – on polystyrene anion exchanger AN-31. The experiments were performed under static conditions at a liquid-to-solid ratio of 1:1, pH value of 2, temperature of 298 K and initial REM concentration in the solutions ranging from 0.83 to 226.31 mmol/kg. Thermodynamic description of sorption isotherms was carried out by the method based on linearization of the mass action equation, modified for the ion exchange reaction. As a result of performed calculations, the authors obtained the constants of ion exchange equilibrium for Pr, Nd and Sm, as well as the values of the change in the Gibbs energy for the ion exchange of REM sulfate complexes on the AN-31 anion exchanger and the values of total capacity of the anion exchanger. Calculated separation factors indicated low selectivity of AN-31 anionite exchanger for light REMs; however, the anion exchanger is suitable for effective recovery of a sum of light REMs. Based on the average value of ion exchange equilibrium constant for light REMs, parameters of a sorption unit with a fluidized bed of anion exchanger were estimated.
