Water Recovery with Ultraseps Technology


A 10 m diameter Bateman-Ultrasep at AVG Mineração SA recovering water from spiral plant fines.
To whom do you turn for technology if you want to recover water from feed containing a high proportion of ultrafine material, specifically the tailings from spirals plants? For two Brazilian iron ore producers the choice was Netherlands-headquartered Bateman Engineering. Both AVG Mineração, which is based in Belo Horizonte and produces lump ore and sinter feed, and V&M Mineração, whose Pau Branco mine is located in Brumadinho, Minas Gerais, use spirals plants that output tailings feed at rates between 90–95 mt/h. First, representatives of the two companies were shown Bateman-Ultrasep thickening technology in South Africa and visited operating installations. Following studies of process data and test work with client samples at Bateman Engineering’s Johannesburg laboratories, the solution offered to each of the Brazilian operators was the use of a 10-m-diameter Bateman-Ultrasep thickener, one of the larger sizes in a range covering 0.5- to 12-m diameter. Bateman says this thickener design has very rapid rise rates that reduce the required thickening area. Consequently, the Ultrasep can process flow rates and tonnages that would require a larger conventional or high-rate thickener. The substantial size reduction brings down the capital cost of the comparable Ultrasep, possibly by as much as 50% for a given application. The design has a high tolerance to handle fluctuations, making the Ultrasep easy to start up, stabilize and automate. In addition, the thickener has no moving parts so that maintenance is almost eliminated. In the U.S., Ultrasep sales and service are handled by Westech of Salt Lake City, Utah. The contracts with AVG and V&M cover Bateman supplying the engineering and drawings for the two units so that fabrication and erection could be carried out in Brazil under supervision by a Bateman Engineering agent. Bateman also provided fully manufactured flocculant optimizers with underflow pump control and supervised commissioning. For V&M Mineração, whose Bateman-Ultrasep is treating itabirite tailings from the Itabirito ore concentration unit at Pau Branco, the company also supplied further key components of a flocculant plant plus a design for local fabrication and procurement of non-core components.