Abstract

Flash furnace matte at the Chagres smelter in Chile is converted to blister copper in Peirce-Smith converters. The produced slag from each of the two slag blows is transferred to the slag cleaning furnaces (along with flash furnace slag) for cleaning prior to discharge, while the high copper slag from the copper blow is recirculated back to the converter process. The performance of the slag cleaning furnace is dependent in part on the quality of the converter slag. In order to understand the impact of converter slag quality on slag cleaning and to help optimize the slag cleaning operation, thermodynamic modeling of the converter slag, supported by microscopic examination of smelter slag samples, was carried out to characterize the Peirce-Smith converter slag. The results of the investigation are described and discussed in this paper.