Patent ID: 9322081
Filing Date: 2016-04-26
CPC Classification: B22F,C22B,C22C,H01G,Y10T

Claim Text:
1. Method of recovering target component metals from a source material comprising alloys or other natural or synthesized mixtures of metals in elemental form or as metal compounds, the target component metals of source material being selected as two or more from the group consisting of rhenium, tantalum, niobium, tungsten, molybdenum, nickel, cobalt and iron, but including at least one of rhenium, tantalum, molybdenum, tungsten, niobium as target metal and comprising the steps of: (a) heating the material with iodine to convert at least some of the component metals to metal iodides, (b) separating the iodides by fractional volatilization or condensation, (c) at a temperature above 1000° C., converting at least one metal iodide so produced, to a metal product and iodine, and (d) looping recovered iodine back to step (a).