Patent ID: 8852549
Filing Date: 2014-10-07
Classification: C22B,Y02P

Abstract:
1. A method for maintaining a ratio of oxime to equilibrium modifier concentration in solvent extraction circuits, wherein the solvent extraction circuit includes a plant organic comprising a solvent consisting essentially of (a) at least one ketoxime and/or aldoxime; (b) at least one equilibrium modifier; and (c) at least one diluent; the method comprising: (i) taking a sample of the plant organic, determining a copper max load and an equilibrated strip point of the plant organic; (ii) preparing a solution A comprising (a) and (c) to give a copper max load equivalent to that of the plant organic, diluting small portions of the plant organic with solution A to provide a plurality of diluted solutions, determining an equilibrated strip point of each diluted solution and graphing the equilibrated strip point versus the degree of dilution of the plant organic, wherein the degree of dilution of the plant organic is taken as 1, to create a calibration curve; (iii) preparing a solution of a fresh reagent composition comprising (a), (b) and (c) having a copper max load (CuML) equivalent to that of the plant organic and determining its equilibrated strip point (EqSP1); (iv) determining a required dilution factor, D, by selecting a point on the calibration curve having an equilibrated strip point equal to the equilibrated strip point (EqSP1) for the fresh reagent composition and finding the corresponding degree of dilution; (v) calculating a volume V  wherein V (vi) adding a sufficient volume of oxime (a) and diluent (c) to the plant organic to be effectively equivalent to adding a volume of organic phase equal to V (vii) repeating (i) to (vi) as necessary.