A novel approach for pre-concentrating vanadium from stone coal ore

Stone coal is an important vanadium-bearing resource in China and accounts for about 87% of the domestic reserves of vanadium. But the currently developed techniques to extract vanadium from stone coal are all confronted with environmental problems. In order to solve those problems, an innovative process for pre-concentrating vanadium from stone coal was designed. Firstly, the environment-friendly Fe2O3 is selected as a capturer of vanadium. Secondly, the reducing nature of stone coal is utilized to promote the formation of magnetic V-rich phase, Fe2VO4. Thirdly, a high-grade vanadium concentrate is obtained by magnetic separation method. The feasibility of this design was confirmed using industrial stone coal at a laboratory scale. When 10 mass% Fe2O3 relative to stone coal was added and roasted at 1200 °C for 3 h, a high-grade concentrate with vanadium content of 14% and recovery rate of 92% was recovered.