Sedgman Novopro has participated in a number of projects that looked to recover Lithium directly from ore bodies, as value added minerals from tailings piles or waste brine streams of operating facilities, with an ultimate goal to produce both Li2CO3 or LiOH. With this, Sedgman Novopro has developed expertise in;
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Ore Recovery – From both conventional underground and surface mining, as well as brine recovery from surface lakes, trenches and wells developed in Playas, and from solution mining directly in the ore body.
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Crushing – Crushing and grinding of recovered ore is featured in all of our conventional mining projects, with optimization based upon the abrasion index, crusher and grind work index, and the physical properties required by the process.
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Leaching – We have designed and tested multiple leaching configurations for several projects in order to establish the concentration, retention time, and temperature of the leachate to optimize the recovery of lithium.
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Purification – Multi-stage purification processes such as reacting the solution with lime to remove calcium and magnesium, NaOH and Na2CO3 addition to precipitate Mg/Mn/Ca minerals, and the use of Ion Exchange. Sedgman Novopro has extensive experience in both testing and modeling all types of leach reactors, and experience with Ion Exchange technologies.
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Evaporation – To increase the concentration of lithium in brines, Sedgman Novopro possesses an in-depth knowledge of evaporation circuit design and optimization, with numerous trade-off studies completed between forced evaporation MVR, MEE and evaporation ponds the solution undergoes an evaporation step.
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Solid-Liquid Separation – The removal of solids from liquids in lithium processes can sometimes be complex. Sedgman Novopro has designed and tested processing circuits with complex solid-liquid separation challenges including fine particles sizes and hydrated minerals as by-products.
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Mass Balance Modeling/Testing – Sedgman Novopro has designed mass balances that contain complex chemistry using state of the art computer models for both ponds and process. Additionally, these models have been used to guide laboratory testing to confirm both process parameters and equilibrium data. Certain applications require the development of pilot scale testing programs, with which Sedgman Novopro's expertise was critical.