Study of the Performance Indices of a Dust-Cleaning System at the Balkhash Copper Smelter

The Balkhash Copper Smelter makes black copper from sulfide concentrates in two Vanyukov furnaces and five monotypic converters. Each furnace has its own primary gas-cleaning system, which includes a waste-heat boiler with two flues at the outlet, a dust chamber, and a TsN-24 group cyclone. The gases from the furnaces and the converters are mixed and are sent through a collecting duct and a high-velocity duct to a secondary cleaning system that includes seven parallel dry electrostatic precipitators. The gases are subsequently sent to the sulfuric acid shop. Dust from the process gases and dust deposits in the dust-catching equipment were subjected to chemical analysis to determine their contents of metals. As the process gases moved toward the sulfuric acid shop, their lead content increased from 30.32 to 38.31% while their copper content decreased from 6.73 to 2.52%. These changes can be attributed to the fact that lead undergoes sublimation more readily than copper. Study of the content of metals in different dust fractions showed that copper is concentrated in the coarser fractions and lead is located mainly in the particles smaller than 10.5 μm.