Mineral transition of desilication products precipitated in synthetic sodium aluminate solution under atmospheric pressure
(School of Metallurgy, Northeastern University, Shenyang 110819, China)
Abstract: The liquor concentration, mineral proportion, crystal parameters and micro morphology of various desilication products (DSPs) precipitated in silica-supersaturated sodium aluminate solution at 95 °C under different reaction conditions were systematically researched. The DSPs formed under atmospheric pressure comprise amorphous phase, zeolite A, zeolite and sodalite, and the DSPs concentration and crystallinity increase with the increase of initial silica concentration, initial molar ratio of caustic Na2O to Al2O3 (αK) and desilication duration. Decreasing the initial silica concentration, initial αK and increasing the desilication duration can reduce the proportion of zeolite A. The zeolite and sodalite are the stable DSPs, while the precipitation of zeolite A occurs at a high silica-supersaturated state in sodium aluminate solution. The DSPs are precipitated in the form of agglomerates, but the morphologies of various DSPs are quite different. Both the molar ratios of Na2O to Al2O3 and SiO2 to Al2O3 in DSPs increase with the increasing desilication duration, resulting in the increase of the cell volumes of various DSPs. The precipitation sequence of DSPs under atmospheric pressure is: amorphous phase→zeolite A→zeolite→sodalite.
Key words: Bayer process; desilication; sodium aluminate solution; zeolite; sodalite