Mineral Processing and Metallurgical Treatment of Lead Vanadate Ores

Abstract

Vanadium has been strongly moving into focus in the last decade. Due to its chemical properties, vanadium is vital for applications in the upcoming renewable energy revolution as well as usage in special alloys. The uprising demand forces the industry to consider the exploration of less attractive sources besides vanadiferous titanomagnetite deposits, such as lead vanadate deposits. Mineral processing and metallurgical treatment of lead vanadate deposits stopped in the 1980s, although the deposits contain a noteworthy amount of the desired resource vanadium. There has been a wide variety of research activities in the first half of the last century, including density sorting and flotation to recover concentrates as well as pyro- and hydrometallurgical treatment to produce vanadium oxide. There have been ecological issues and technical restrictions in the past that made these deposits uninteresting. Meanwhile, regarding the development of mineral processing and metallurgy, there are methods and strategies to reconsider lead vanadates as a highly-potential vanadium resource. This review does not merely provide an overview of lead vanadate sources and the challenges in previous mechanical and metallurgical processing activities, but shows opportunities to ensure vanadium production out of primary sources in the future.