Experimental Study on Beneficiation of Ion-adsorbed Type Rare Earth Ore in Guangxi

According to the mineralogical characteristics of an ion-adsorbed type rare earth ore in Guangxi, the process mineralogy of the ore samples was studied, and the beneficiation experiments of leaching, impurity removal, precipitation and recovery of rare earth from slag were carried out. The research results show that when the concentration of ammonium sulfate leaching agent is 2%, the unit consumption is 7 t/t and the solid-liquid ratio of washing water is 0.45 m³/m³, the rare earth leaching rate can reach 99.3%. When the pH of impurity removal is controlled at 5.42, the removal rate of aluminum can reach 97.2%, and the loss rate of rare earth is 6.1%. When the unit consumption of ammonium bicarbonate is 2.6 t/t, the precipitation rate of rare earth can reach 98%. The slag after removing impurity is also treated with sulfuric acid to recover the rare earth. According to the leaching rate of rare earth and the recovery rate of hydrometallurgy, the recovery rate of ionic rare earth beneficiation can reach 91.4%, which exceeds the requirement of the former Ministry of Land and Resources for the recovery rate of ionic rare earth mines to be more than 90%. Finally, the recommended beneficiation process is put forward to evaluate the industrial utilization performance of the ore, which provides the necessary experimental basis for the economic evaluation and mine construction of the ion-adsorbed type rare earth ore.