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American Journal of Chemistry and Application

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Solubilities of As, Sb and Bi in Copper Electrolyte and Their Existing Forms in Copper Anode Slime

American Journal of Chemistry and Application
Vol.6 , No. 3, Publication Date: Jun. 28, 2019, Page: 38-44

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Authors

[1]	Xuewen Wang, School of Metallurgy and Environment, Central South University, Changsha, China.
[2]	Xingming Wang, School of Metallurgy and Environment, Central South University, Changsha, China.
[3]	Yajie Zheng, School of Metallurgy and Environment, Central South University, Changsha, China.
[4]	Mingyu Wang, School of Metallurgy and Environment, Central South University, Changsha, China.
[5]	Yinglin Peng, College of Chemistry and Environment Engineering, Hunan City University, Yiyang, China.
[6]	Tao Cui, Kunming Metallurgical Research Institute, Kunming, China.

Abstract

Since copper electrorefining has been used in industrial production, the purification of copper electrolyte has received much attention, but the solubilities of As, Sb and Bi in copper electrolyte have not been systematically studied. In this paper, the solubilities of As, Sb and Bi in copper electrolyte and their existing forms in copper anode slime were studied. It was found that the solubilities of Sb(III), Bi(III) and Sb(V) all increase first and then decrease sharply with the increase in H₂SO₄ concentration. As(V) can increase the solubilities of Sb(III), Bi(III) and Sb(V) in H₂SO₄ solution as it can combine with them to form complexes, while As(III) can only make the solubility of Sb(III) increase. Though As(V) can make the solubilities of Sb(III), Bi(III) and Sb(V) increase, their solubilities in copper electrolyte don’t increase but decrease with the increase in arsenic concentration because they can combine with each other to form the precipitate of arsenato antimonates under normal conditions. The solubility of Sb(III) in copper electrolyte decreases noticeably with the decrease in temperature from 55°C to 33°C, which leads to the obvious increase in copper electrolyte turbidity. Moreover, it was confirmed that the As, Sb and Bi containing in copper anode slime and floating slime are all in the form of amorphous, and they cannot be turned into crystal until the treatment temperature rise to over 500°C.

Keywords

Copper Electrolyte, Arsenic, Antimony, Bismuth, Solubility

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