Recovery of Vanadium from Esfahan Steel Company Steel Slag; Optimizing of Roasting and Leaching Parameters

In this Study, vanadium recovery from the steelmaking converter slag was studied. Salt roasting-basic leaching is the process which was applied to separate and extract vanadium from steel making slag. Ground slag was roasted after mixing with determined quantities of sodium carbonate. The effect of time and temperature of roasting and sodium carbonate content were studied. The optimum temperature, time and sodium carbonate content in the roasting process were found to be 1000oC, 45 min and 10%, respectively. Temperature, time, leachant concentration and particle size were optimized for leaching process. It was determined that sodium carbonate is the major leaching agent in comparison with sodium hydroxide. The most suitable conditions for leaching process was found to be 80oC, 60 min, sodium carbonate to sodium hydroxide mass ratio of 40-50:10 and particle size between 100 and 120 mesh. More than 80% of vanadium was recovered under optimum conditions.