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EU MSCA-ETN REDMUD
April 2018
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Policy Brief | April 2018 | RED MUD
B
stored in lagoon-type impoundments
auxite residue (BR) is produced and the practice continues at some fa-
as a red slurry (hence the com- cilities.
mon term “red mud”) and con-
tains iron minerals and other non-alu- As the land for lagoon storage became
mina-bearing bauxite minerals, as well scarce for many plants, “dry stack-
as the liquor desilication product (cal- ing” methods were adopted. These
cium and sodium alumino-silicate pre- dry-stacking regimes were first adopted
cipitates) from the Bayer process cycle. in the 1940s, and since the 1980s the
It is estimated that for each tonne of trend has been increasingly towards dry
alumina produced, 0.9-1.5 tonnes of stacking in order to reduce the poten-
solid residue are generated, depending tial for the leakage of caustic liquor to
on the initial bauxite-ore grade and the the surrounding environment, reduce
alumina’s extraction efficiency. As the the land area required, and maximise
global demand for aluminium metal the recoveries of soda and alumina.
increases, so does BR production, cur- Dry stacking is now the most common
rently in excess of 150 million tons per method adopted at large alumina refin-
year, worldwide. This BR is generated at eries.
some 60 active Bayer plants. In addition,
there are at least another 50 closed leg- Filtration using drum filters and plate
acy sites, so the combined stockpile of Filter-pressed (dry) bauxite residue
and frame filter presses to recover caus- being stockpiled in Greece, at Mytilneos
bauxite residue at the active and legacy tic soda, reduce moisture levels and re- S.A. (former Aluminum of Greece)
sites is estimated at 3-4 billion tonnes. alise more handle-able bauxite residue
has been employed for some 80 years,
The management and storage of baux- and is now becoming more popular.
ite residue have evolved over the dec- In addition to recovering more caustic
ades. In the early Bayer alumina plants, materials, this technique provides con-
the residue was often just stockpiled siderable benefits in terms of reuse as
close to the site or in a nearby depleted the material is normally produced as a
bauxite/shale/coal mine or quarry sites. friable cake, with typically less than 28%
Later, as the nearby areas were filled, moisture, and a lower soda content,
valleys were dammed to contain the ev- thereby dramatically reducing transport
er-growing volume of residue. Prior to issues and costs .
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Policy Brief | April 2018 | RED MUD
2% 2%
recovery of minor elements other
2% 1%
gas-scrubbing agent minor additives
4%
33%
soil amendment or production
civil & building
7% construction
9%
recovery of major
metals (Fe, Ti, Al, Na)
12%
waste & water
treatment 13%
catalysts support
12% or adsorbent
ceramics, plastics,
coatings or pigments
Patents on BR processing divided into
areas of intended usage
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Policy Brief | April 2018 | RED MUD
Alumina
Aluminium
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Policy Brief | April 2018 | RED MUD
European Alumina and BR production Country Location Total Alumina An- Estimated BR
nual Capacity (kt) (kt)
(source EA)
are rare and can only be applied on a However, despite more than 50 years
fraction of the produced BR in a refin- of research and many publications
ery. Globally, BR as an iron (or alumi- and patents, the widespread, high-add-
na) source in clinker cement production ed-value use of BR has not taken place.
is perhaps the most widespread BR uti- This is due to several barriers that ham-
lization, varying between 2 and 4 mil- per its effective exploitation such as:
lion tonnes per year worldwide (mostly • Volume: Applications that consume
in China and India). This represents large quantities of residue are re-
less than 3% of BR global production, quired.
as this practice is challenged by various • Performance: The performance of
factors ranging from transport costs the residue in any application must
and logistics, to limitations imposed by be competitive with the alternatives
process chemistry, leading effectively to in relation to quality, cost and risk.
small amounts of BR in the raw meal • Costs: No strong economic case has
of the clinker. Out of the 6.8 million yet been established. Technical prop-
tonnes of BR produced annually in ositions need to come with a justifi-
Europe, only 10 thousand tonnes are able economic analysis that demon-
re-used in Greece as a raw material for strates viability.
clinker cement. • Risk: It must be proved to industry
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Policy Brief | April 2018 | RED MUD
Bauxite ore
Aluminium industry
Bauxite residue
Mud2Metal
Selective
REE oxides Sc metal production Al-Sc alloy
leaching/separation
that the associated risk in any appli- ence between producing Fe-Si instead
cation is less than the risk associated of pig-iron or a pure Sc2O3 concentrate
with continued storage. instead of mixed REE/Sc concentrate.
Technologically, BR reuse solutions can The scenario developed assumes the
be found as stand-alone in the litera- processing of the entire annual BR pro-
ture, but pooling them together and op- duction of AoG (i.e., 700,000 tonnes)
timizing them in an integrated manner and presents the total low and high rev-
is the only way to render bauxite residue enue to be achieved against an averaged
reuse viable from an economic point of and simplified OPEX. Similar techno-
view and acceptable for industry. economic assessments for a holistic BR
It is thus necessary to combine more treatment flow sheet have been pub-
than one technology in order to achieve lished by other groups.
viable and meaningful BR utilization.
Bauxite residue as resource in Eu-
The financial viability of such an ap- rope
proach has been published at a concep-
tual level by AoG, based on RTD expe- Bauxite Residue from the alumina in-
rienced. In the table (below) and graph dustry is stockpiled at a rate of 7 mil-
(next page), a scenario combing EAF lion tonnes on a dry basis per year in
processing for iron production, hydro- Europe:
metallurgical leaching for REE/Sc and • With an average iron oxide content
slag valorisation for cement, inorganic of 40 wt%, it can be considered as
polymers and mineral wool is examined. an equivalent of 3.4 million tonnes
The end-product value in each case is of iron ore available in Europe. This
strongly dependent on integrated pro- results in a 4% decrease in iron-ore
cessing and innovation, i.e., the differ- imports and a 18% increase in Euro-
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Policy Brief | April 2018 | RED MUD
€136,007,216
€96,200,000 €105,000,000
€14,000,000
€68,005,412
€59,000,000 €209,000,000 €210,000,000
Examples of holistic BR processing
concepts, based on the mud2metal €62,700,000
flowsheet, described in the table on the
previous page.
Low High OPEX
BR
slurry C SiO2 Alkalis
waterglass
H2O
Filter press
BR cake Alkaline
liquor
Inorganic
polymer
Rotary
Flowsheet for producing novel building kiln Precursor
materials (Inorganic Polymers) and
iron concentrates from BR Iron recovery
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Policy Brief | April 2018 | RED MUD
• costs for licensing the transfer and the waste does not pose a threat to hu-
the cost of the transfer itself (more man health and others. However, such *Bio: Efthymios Balomenos
so across boarders) de-characterisation decisions are very Dr. Efthymios Balomenos studied
• potential gate fees at the end-user difficult to be reached independently by mining and metallurgical engineering
industry, a practice that is very com- national governments, as such issues are at the National Technical University
mon, effectively negating the premise very sensitive for the public. A related of Athens and received his PhD
of a circular economy. EC wide directive/policy on de-charac- degree in thermodynamics from
The alternative, i.e., to landfill the BR, terization of BR is needed. the same school in 2006. Since
is often not only the more economical 2008 he has been working in the
solution but also a far less complicated 2. Provide incentives to industries Laboratory of Metallurgy as a
solution. for prioritizing the use of industrial postdoc researcher focusing on
by-products over virgin raw materials. sustainable process development,
To lift such barriers two main policy ac- Currently, industries that could utilize CO2-mitigation strategies, exergy
tions are identified: BR as iron and alumina sources in their analysis and resource-utilization
process have no incentive to do so, as efficiency. He has been involved
1. Simplify the de-characterization pro- virgin raw materials are cheap and their in the coordination and research
cess for BR (especially when it is de- use less complicated. Companies would management of several European
livered as material with less than 30% only use BR if it comes at a lower price Research projects under FP7 and
moisture) from waste to by-product or or even at negative price (gate fees). H2020. He has 25 publications in
raw material. This would greatly simplify The EU needs to provide economic peer-reviewed journals and books
both the transport and the reuse of BR and social incentives to industries that with over 180 citations (h-index 8).
in other industries, driving down costs promote circular-economy practices, The majority of these publications
and time. The legislative framework for otherwise by-products like BR will only relate in one way or another to the
this already exists in many countries, as be utilized where and when virgin raw field of bauxite-residue treatment.
a non-hazardous waste can be de-char- materials are scarce or depleted. In- Since 2015 he has been employed
acterised if the appropriate conditions centives could have the form of tax re- in Mytilineos S.A.- Aluminium of
exist; such as: there is a use for the ductions, CO2 emission allowances, and Greece as residue-valorisation
waste in other process, that the use of gree-product labels. engineer and represents Mytilineos
at the European Aluminium
Innovation Hub..
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Policy Brief | April 2018 | RED MUD
* Disclaimer: the views expressed in this article are the private views of the author and may not, under any circumstances, be interpreted as stating an official
position of ETN REDMUD or SIM² KU Leuven.
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