The Effect of Lead in Copper Electrorefining

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Kemian tekniikan korkeakoulu | Bachelor's thesis
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Date

2025-09-01

Department

Major/Subject

Chemical Engineering

Mcode

CHEM3054

Degree programme

Aalto Bachelor's Programme in Science and Technology

Language

en

Pages

21+3

Series

Abstract

To meet the rising copper demand, the industry decides to recycle secondary copper sources for copper production. It results in more impurities including lead appearing in the electrorefining process at the end of the copper production process. There are numerous studies that investigate the effects of some impurities like Ni, As, Sb, and Bi, but there are only a few studies that focuses on lead and its effects. As a result, this study explores the effects of lead in the copper electrorefining process and assess the risk of lead contamination in copper cathodes when copper anodes contain more impurities. This study finds that almost all of the lead impurities in copper anodes accumulate in the anode slime as PbSO4. It causes the anode slime to become thicker and more adhesive which results in passivation of the anodes and nodulations on copper cathodes. Consequently, it promotes lead and other impurities contamination in copper cathodes. Therefore, this study concludes that it can be a notable risk of lead contamination in copper cathodes when copper anodes contain high impurities content. However, the risk can be mitigated and controlled, so it should not pose much of a problem to the industry.

Description

Supervisor

Hummel, Michael

Thesis advisor

Aromaa, Jari

Keywords

copper electrorefining, adherent anode slime, anode passivation, lead sulphate, lead contamination, cathode nodulation

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https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:aalto-202510218383

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[kand] Kemian tekniikan korkeakoulu / CHEM