Method for separating the mixture of zirconium oxide/hafnium oxide by pyrometallurgy
View Patent ↗A method for separating zirconium oxide/hafnium oxide by pyrometallurgy. The mixture of zirconium oxide/hafnium oxide, carbon and pure bromine react one hour at 650° C., then added to molten salt mixture for rectifying separation, and then maintained two hours at rectifying tower bottom below 357° C., to get the non-target substance; and then maintained five hours at 357° C. to collect the target substance zirconium tetrabromide; the residue in the reactor is retained, then rectification separation is performed in the same device, heated to 400° C. to retain more than five hours, to get hafnium tetrabromide, then the zirconium tetrabromide and hafnium tetrabromide are substituted by magnesium to get the pure zirconium and pure hafnium.
1. A method for separating zirconium oxide and hafnium oxide from a mixture of zirconium oxide and hafnium oxide comprises the following steps:
mixing the mixture of zirconium oxide and hafnium oxide, carbon and pure bromine, reacting one hour at 650° C. which results in a mixture of zirconium tetrabromide and hafnium tetrabromide;
adding the mixture of zirconium tetrabromide and hafnium tetrabromide into molten salt for rectification separation, and maintaining the rectification for two hours at 200-357° C. which yields a non-target substance at the top of a rectification tower, wherein the molten salt is a molten mixture of potassium fluoride and aluminum potassium sulfate with a weight ratio of 1.2-1.6:1;
maintaining for additional five hours at 357° C.-360° C., collecting a target substance zirconium tetrabromide from the top of the rectification tower;
performing the rectification separation in the rectification tower, heat up to 400-403° C. and maintaining for five hours, and then collecting the hafnium tetrabromide from the top of the rectification tower.
2. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the temperature for collecting the zirconium tetrabromide is 357° C.
3. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the temperature for collecting the hafnium tetrabromide is 400° C.
4. The method according to claim 1 , wherein it further comprises: performing a magnetism replacement for the zirconium tetrabromide which yields a pure zirconium.
5. The method according to claim 1 , wherein it further comprises: performing a magnetism replacement for the hafnium tetrabromide which yields a pure hafnium.