Defence of Vitalis Chipakwe’s PhD thesis
Vitalis Chipakwe has been working on a PhD study partly funded by the Kolarctic CBC SEESIMA project. The topic is “Application of Chemical Additives in Mineral Beneficiation – Implications on Grinding and Flotation”. Vitalis has now prepared the thesis and will be defending the thesis on the 21st February 2023 from 1000 to 1200, at Luleå Technical University, room F1031. The defence can also be followed online on Zoom at this link.
The PhD was concerned with investigating improvements to the size reduction process of mineral processing, which consume large amounts of energy and are necessary to liberate the valuable components from the rest of the ore. The size reduction also traditionally uses large amounts of water, which then requires waste water treatment.
The initial part of Vitalis’ study was concerned with the dry grinding process, that uses less water than traditional wet grinding. Dry grinding can reduce the water consumption, but also requires more energy than wet grinding. Additives that allow a reduction of the energy consumption were investigated, including natural polymer additives as an alternative to synthetic polymers.
The study then continued by studying the effect of the additives on the downstream separation process (such as flotation), as well as the effect of the additives on the energy consumption of traditional wet grinding.
Vitalis is now working as a Development Engineer at Boliden in Skellefteå.