Articles & Issues

Language: English

Conflict of Interest: In relation to this article, we declare that there is no conflict of interest.

Publication history: Received May 21, 2013
Accepted July 24, 2013

This is an Open-Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/bync/3.0) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

All issues

Modeling and simulation of solvent extraction processes for purifying rare earth metals with PC88A

Kyung Hwan Ryu Changkyu Lee¹ Go-Gi Lee¹ Sungkoo Jo¹ Su Whan Sung^†

Department of Chemical Engineering, Kyungpook National University, 1370, Sankyeok-dong, Buk-gu, Daegu 702-701, Korea ¹Research Institute of Industrial & Science Technology, San 32, Hyoja-dong, Nam-gu, Pohang 790-784, Korea

suwhansung@knu.ac.kr

Korean Journal of Chemical Engineering, October 2013, 30(10), 1946-1953(8), 10.1007/s11814-013-0135-3

Download PDF

Abstract

A new simulation logic and thermodynamic equilibrium analysis algorithm combined with a new model simplification technique was developed to simulate the solvent extraction process for purifying rare earth metals from chloride solution with 2-ethylhexyl phosphonic acid mono-2-ethylhexyl ester (PC88A) as a solvent. The proposed model simplification method significantly reduces the number of the nonlinear equilibrium equations to be simultaneously solved to overcome the initial guess problem and obtain numerically stable convergence pattern in solving the equilibrium analysis problem and performing the rigorous simulation of the extraction process. A new equilibrium analysis algorithm on the basis of the simplified nonlinear equilibrium equations is also proposed to estimate the equilibrium concentrations by solving the rigorous first principle extraction model. Finally, a solvent extraction simulator is developed to estimate all the concentrations of all the stages of the solvent extraction process by solving the equilibrium_x000D_ analysis problem at each stage in a sequential way. The proposed simulator doe not suffer from the initial guess problem and shows very robust convergence pattern without any numerical problems.

Keywords

Solvent Extraction PC88A Rare Earth Distribution Coefficient Simulation Equilibrium Analysis Model Simplification

References

Gupta CK, Krishnamurthy N, Extractive Metallurgy of Rare Earths, CRC PRESS (2005)
Sato T, Hydrometallurgy., 22, 121 (1989)
Goto T, Smutz M, J. Nuci. Sci. Technol., 2(10), 410 (1965)
Thakur NV, Jayawant DV, Iyer NS, Koppiker KS, Hydrometallurgy., 34, 99 (1993)
Giles AE, Aldrich C, van Deventer JSJ, Hydrometallurgy., 43, 241 (1996)
Thakur NV, Solvent Extraction and Ion Exchange., 18(5), 853 (2000)
Mishra SL, Singh H, Gupta CK, Hydrometallurgy., 56, 33 (2000)
Anitha M, Singh H, Desalination, 232(1-3), 59 (2008)
Yang H, Lu R, Zhang K, Wang X, J. Comput., 7, 2557 (2012)
Lee M, Lee G, Lee J, Kim S, Kim J, J. Kor. Inst. Met. Mater., 43(5), 393 (2005)
Lee G, Lee J, Kim S, Kim J, Park J, Lee M, J. Korean Inst.Res. Rec., 13(2), 24 (2004)
Lee M, Lee G, Lee J, Kim S, Kim J, J. Kor. Inst. Met. Mater., 42, 829 (2004)
Lee M, Lee G, Lee J, Kim S, Kim J, J. Kor. Inst. Met. Mater., 42(10), 835 (2004)
Lee M, Lee J, Kim J, Metals and Materials International., 11(6), 393 (2005)