The current status of vanadium extraction from lignite in our country

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This post was last edited by x178181454 on 2010-10-30 at 20:27. The extraction of vanadium from lignite in our country has been an activity going on for several decades, yet the entire industry remains quite backward. Current enterprises involved in this process face high costs and low recovery rates, making it very difficult for them to survive. Analyzing the reasons, there are mainly three: 1. **Insufficient investment in this industry. 2. Most corporate investors have many misconceptions about the vanadium extraction industry from stone coal. 3. Many processing technologies are substandard. I. **Insufficient investment in this industry.** Due to insufficient investment in this industry, a complete theory for vanadium extraction from lignite has not been developed. Many technicians have only a superficial understanding of vanadium extraction from lignite, and no complete system has been established. II. Most corporate investors have many misconceptions about the vanadium extraction industry from stone coal. Misconception 1: The vanadium industry is a highly polluting industry. People assume that vanadium production is a highly polluting process, especially when sodium-based methods are used; however, this is not the case. The main pollutants generated in the sodium process are hydrogen chloride and sulfur dioxide gases produced during roasting; these two gases are easy to treat and their treatment costs are low. There are no toxic or harmful components in the waste residues and wastewater, as evidenced by the long-term use of lignite as an admixture in cement production. Why do people form wrong perceptions? It is because many small, home-based factories do not treat their exhaust gases; hydrogen chloride and sulfur dioxide are released directly into the air, where they form hydrochloric acid and sulfurous acid, which can kill the plants in the surrounding area. Error 2: Vanadium is an industry with huge profits. Extracting vanadium from lignite is not at all profitable, and only very few companies are able to make a profit from it. Why? The reason is as follows: 1. The price of vanadium has remained low for a long time; over the 25-year period from 1986 to 2010, there were only three periods of high prices (160,000 yuan per ton in June and July 1989, 350,000 yuan per ton from April to June 2005, and 280,000 yuan per ton in July and August 2008), and these periods lasted very briefly. For the most part, prices remained low; before 1989, the price of vanadium was 40,000–50,000 yuan per ton, from 1990 to 2004 it was 30,000–50,000 yuan per ton, and from 2006 to 2010 the price of vanadium was 70,000–100,000 yuan per ton. 2. Vanadium recovery rates are generally low and costs are high in lignite-based vanadium extraction enterprises. Typically, vanadium recovery rates in lignite-based vanadium extraction enterprises are only around 40%, with costs of about 100,000 yuan per ton, making production unfeasible. 3. The leading companies in China’s vanadium industry, Panzhihua and Chengde, have high production volumes (around 30,000 tons per year) and low costs (the project cost is no more than 60,000 yuan per ton). The two families jointly established a vanadium trading company whose annual trade volume accounts for around 20% of the world’s total, giving it significant influence over international vanadium prices. It holds the power to set prices domestically; when demand is high, they drive up vanadium prices, and when demand is low, they drive them down. Error 3: Extracting vanadium from lignite is simple. Many people think that extracting vanadium from lignite is easy and that it can be done as long as there is enough money; in reality, however, it is very difficult. Lignite contains only about 1% vanadium, with 99% being impurities, and it is quite challenging to achieve a vanadium content of 98% in the final product. Competition with Panzhihua and Chengde, which use steel slag to extract vanadium (with 10-20% vanadium content in the steel slag), makes things even more difficult. In 2005, the price of vanadium rose to around 350,000 yuan, leading to the construction of many large-scale producers of vanadium from lignite in China. Nowadays, most of these facilities are unable to operate properly and are facing great difficulties. Error 4: Possessing lignite resources equates to wealth. Lignite (containing vanadium) is extremely abundant in China; it can be found from Zhejiang in the east to Xinjiang in the west, from the Gobi Desert in the north to Guangxi in the south, with deposits present in more than a dozen provinces across the country. Since lignite contains only 1% vanadium, its commercial value is limited; profitability is possible only by establishing integrated enterprises for mining, processing, and smelting at the source site. III. Many processing technologies are inadequate. The technologies for extracting vanadium from lignite generally originate from research institutions or from the technical staff of existing enterprises that specialize in this process. Research institutions generally focus on laboratory techniques, and there is still a distance to go before these can be applied in industrial production ； Old vitriol extraction enterprises from lignite generally use traditional methods for production; their technical staff lack the ability to innovate, making it impossible to establish a more advanced enterprise for extracting vanadium from lignite. I am willing to discuss this with vanadium extraction enterprises and technical personnel in the whole country. Mao Hua 13227415138