As gold continues to be one of the most widely used precious metals, more and more companies are expanding their reach in the gold mining and processing industry. And as with any finite resource in a world of growing demand, reclaiming as much of this precious metal as possible from the ore in which it lies, has become more important than ever. In response to this growing demand, technologies in processing have arisen to make the reclamation of gold more successful than ever.
One such advancement, is the use of agglomeration drums in the heap leaching process. The process of heap leaching extracts gold from ore by piling up crushed ore and applying a leaching agent to permeate through the pile, separating the gold from the ore. While this method has been used for decades with success, it has been greatly improved by the addition of an agglomeration drum to the process before the heap.
Agglomeration drums, also known as agglomerators, work by agglomerating the ore fines into rounded, more uniform pellets. This creates a more efficient leach, because round pellets allow more spaces between pellets for more even permeability. Agglomeration drums also provide an opportunity for pre-mixing the leaching solution with the ore, to start the leaching prior to the heap. This too helps create a more efficient leach.
FEECO supplies agglomerators to mining companies around the world. Our high quality rotary ore drums help to yield a more efficient recovery of gold, in a time when reclaiming the most you can is of the utmost importance.
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