Recovery of tetrahedrite from mining waste in Spain

Resumen

The present study is part of the Horizon Europe-START project, which aims to recover tetrahedrite-group minerals present in mine dumps to be used as raw materials for the manufacture of thermoelectric devices. The aim of this work is to identify the mining waste facilities selected in Spain for the recovery of tetrahedrite and to outline the mineral processing operations performed on samples from each site to separate and concentrate this mineral. Ore deposits across Spain were selected based on the potential presence of tetrahedrite in their mining waste. A total of five deposits have been sampled, at which subsequent mineral separation and concentration tests have been conducted. A separation flowsheet is proposed in order to extract a high-purity tetrahedrite concentrate. Experimental results indicate two distinct options for separation approaches, depending on a key parameter that proves decisive in the processing of this mineral, which is whether the mineral paragenesis includes siderite. This study has demonstrated the technical feasibility of concentrating minerals of the tetrahedrite group through simple, cost-effective physical separation techniques-specifically magnetic and gravity separation-where the liberation size of the tetrahedrite exceeds 0.063 mm.