Copper slag is generated when copper and nickel ores are recovered from their parent ores using a pyrometallurgical process, and these ores usually contain other elements which include iron, cobalt, silica, and alumina. Slag is a major problem in the metallurgical industries as it is dumped into heaps which have accumulated into millions of tons over the years. Moreover, they pose a danger to the environment as they occupy vacant land (space problems). Over the past few years, studies have been conducted to investigate the copper slag-producing outlets to learn their behavior, as well as properties of slag, to have the knowledge of how to better reuse and recycle copper slag. This review article provides the environmental and socioeconomic impacts of slag, as well as a characterization of copper slag, with the aim of reusing and recycling the slag to benefit the environment and economy. Recycling methods are considered an attractive technological pathway for reducing waste and greenhouse gas emissions, as well as promoting the concept of circular economy through the utilization of waste. These metal elements have value depending on their characteristics; hence, copper slag is considered as a secondary source of valuable metals. Some of the pyrometallurgical and hydrometallurgical processes to consider are physical separation, magnetic separation, flotation, leaching, and direct reduction roasting of iron (DRI). Some of the possible metals that can be recovered from the copper slag include Cu, Fe, Ni, Co, and Ag (precious metals).

The beneficiation of low-grade iron ores is a key research and development topic in the mineral processing industry. The gradual exhaustion of high-grade iron ore reserves, and rising consumer iron and steel demand globally necessitate efficient low-quality iron ore beneficiation to meet steelmaking quality requirements. This comprehensive review explores various beneficiation techniques for low-quality iron ore, focusing on conventional methods including comminution, froth flotation and gravity separation. This article discusses the principles, processes, and equipment used in these techniques and highlights recent advancements and research efforts in the field. This review also emphasizes the importance of effective beneficiation processes in enhancing economic viability, sustainable resource management, and environmental conservation. Furthermore, it presents a case study of iron ore deposits in Botswana, highlighting the potential economic growth and sustainable development that can be achieved by maximizing resource utilization through reductive roasting, followed by magnetic separation of iron ore using semi-bituminous coal as a reductant. Overall, this review provides valuable insights into low-grade iron ore beneficiation techniques and their significance in meeting the growing demand for high-quality iron and steel products.

The bioenergy production potential from biomasses is dependent on their characteristics. This study characterized pine sawdust samples from Zimbabwe and acacia tortilis samples from Botswana using conventional and spectrometry techniques. The ultimate analysis results for pine were 45.76% carbon (C), 5.54% hydrogen (H), 0.039% nitrogen (N), 0% sulphur (S) and 48.66% oxygen (O) and, for acacia, were 41.47% C, 5.15% H, 1.23% N, 0% S and 52.15% O. Due to the low N and S in the biomasses, they promise to provide cleaner energy than fossil-based sources. Proximate analysis results, on a dry basis, for acacia were 3.90% ash, 15.59% fixed carbon and 76.51% volatiles matter and 0.83%, 20% and 79.16%, respectively, for pine. A calorific value of 17.57 MJ/kg was obtained for pine, compared with 17.27 MJ/kg for acacia, suggesting they are good thermochemical feedstocks. Acacia’s bulk energy density is five times that of pine, making it excellent for compressed wood applications. Though the ash content in acacia was much higher than in pine, it fell below the fouling and slagging limit of 6%. In pyrolysis, however, high ash contents lead to reduced yields or the quality of bio-oil through catalytic reactions. Fourier transform infrared spectrometry indicated the presence of multiple functional groups, as expected for a biomass and its derivatives.

In pursuit of carbon neutrality, the demand for metals that are necessary for the development of clean energy technologies is rapidly increasing. Metallurgical waste, such as slag, presents a promising secondary source of these key metals. This research aims to develop an eco-friendly hydrometallurgical process to recover Cu, Ni, and Co from discarded copper/nickel slag. High-pressure acid leaching (HPAL) was used to selectively leach Ni, Cu, and Co from the fayalite slag, yielding high leaching efficiencies of 99.9%, 89.4%, and 99.9%, respectively, with low Fe and Si tenors to the pregnant leach solution (PLS). The solvent extraction (SX) technique utilizing LIX 984N was used to selectively extract and enrich copper from the dilute PLS to about 23 g/L Cu with a very low Fe concentration of 0.05 g/L. Potassium amyl xanthate (PAX) solution was used to form Ni and Co xanthate complexes from the raffinate solution. Nickel was selectively recovered using ammonia solution, while the cobalt xanthate complex was thermally decomposed and recovered as cobalt oxide solids of about 25 wt.% Co. A comprehensive process flowsheet is presented. Furthermore, to realize the real application of the developed slag cleaning process, a preliminary economic evaluation was performed.

We collected pine dust and Acacia tortilis samples from Zimbabwe and Botswana, respectively. We then pyrolyzed them in a bench-scale plant under varying conditions. This investigation aimed to determine an optimum temperature that will give result to maximum yield and quality of the bio-oil fraction. Our experimental results show that we obtain the maximum yield of the oil fraction at a pyrolysis temperature of 550 °C for the acacia and at 500 °C for the pine dust. Our results also show that we obtain an oil fraction with a heating value (HHV) of 36.807 MJ/kg using acacia as the feed material subject to a primary condenser temperature of 140 °C. Under the same pyrolysis temperature, we obtain an HHV value of 15.78 MJ/kg using pine dust as the raw material at a primary condenser temperature of 110 °C. The bio-oil fraction we obtain from Acacia tortilis at these condensation temperatures has an average pH value of 3.42 compared to that of 2.50 from pine dust. The specific gravity of the oil from Acacia tortilis is 1.09 compared to that of 1.00 from pine dust. We elucidated that pine dust has a higher bio-oil yield of 46.1% compared to 41.9% obtained for acacia. Although the heavy oils at condenser temperatures above 100 °C had good HHVs, the yields were low, ranging from 2.8% to 4.9% for acacia and 0.2% to 12.7% for pine dust. Our future work will entail efforts to improve the yield of the heavy oil fraction and scale up our results for trials on plant scale capacity.

The circular economy initiative has driven the agriculture and agro-based industry to beneficiate from waste,thus closing the material loop towards enhancing economic and environmental performance. In this study, the aim was to recover phosphorus from anaerobic digestate of piggery wastewater (ADPW) using ferrochrome slag (FCSL) as the magnesium source to improve the environmental and economic sustainability of struvite precipitation. This was achieved by leaching 100 g L⁻¹ of ferrochrome slag with 5 M HCl where 14.02 g L⁻¹ of magnesium ions were extracted, and this acid-leachate of ferrochrome slag also contained 2650 mg L⁻¹ of total iron. To simultaneously remove both high concentrations of organic matters in ADPW and iron in FCSL which are known to be detrimental to struvite precipitation, hydrogen peroxide (H₂O₂) at an H₂O₂/Fe molar ratio of 0.75 and pH 4.0 was added to the mixture of ADPW and FCSL. After the Fenton reaction, removal efficiencies of chemical oxygen demand (COD) and total iron reached 95.06% and 94.00%, respectively. Then COD and an iron-reduced mixture of ADPW and FCSL were added with a satisfying Mg:N:P molar ratio of 1.2:1:1.15 at pH 9.5 to produce struvite in 1 h. From 1 L of ADPW (2.6 g NH₃–N), 0.5 L of FCSL (5.34 g Mg²⁺), and 6.62 g of PO₄³⁻ P, were consumed to produce 45.57 g of struvite precipitate. Additionally, the economic feasibility of ferrochrome slag was assessed by estimating the chemical costs of FCSL against that of magnesium chloride which is commercially used. It was observed that using FCSL was cheaper as compared to using commercial MgCl₂. Response surface methodology coupled with the central composite design was applied as a statistical tool to determine the effects of the key parameters (N:P; Mg:PO₄; pH) on phosphorus recovery. Second-order polynomial equations were determined to correlate the parameters. ANOVA was applied and showed that p values for all the investigated parameters were less than 0.05 showing that they had a statistically significant effect on the phosphorus recovery. The study confirmed that it was possible to recover phosphorus as struvite from anaerobic digestate of pig manure with ferrochrome slag as a magnesium source.