World nickel

The trends in total world mine production rates from 1987 to 1992 are evident in Table 3. An 8-yr averaging shows ca 2% growth in annual consumption. The average price of nickel has varied from year to year the actual price more than doubled from 1985 to 1988. However, third quarter 1993 prices dropped below mid-1980 prices to < 4.50/kg. Based on the 1992 world nickel consumption level of 813,900 t and the average annual London Metal Exchange (LME) nickel price, the 1992 monetary value for the nickel mining and refining industry would be approximately 6 x 10 . ... 

Table 3. World Nickel Mine Production and Prices ...

World Nickel Statistics, Vol. Ill, No. 5, International Nickel Study Group, May 1993. 

World nickel metal production in 2002 was 678000 tons [39]. Hydrometallurgy has typically been applied to the treatment of nickel-copper mattes, anode nickel, and reduced laterite ore. The sulfide concentrates are usually oxidized by roasting and then smelted to copper-iron-nickel sulfide matte (75-80% Cu-Ni), which is refined or used directly to make M onel metal. Cathode nickel can be produced from a variety of electrolytes, including chloride, sulfate, or a mixed chloride-sulfate. The former two are acid systems used in leaching and electrowinning. Mixed chloride-sulfate electrolytes are used for electrorefining the nickel sulfide matte from the traditional matte-smelting operations. 

Other sources of nickel, especially in deep-ocean polymetallic nodules (see Manganese) lying on the Pacific Ocean floor, will probably have an important economic role in the future. As a general rule, to be mineable, a nickel ore deposit must be able to produce annually at least 40,000 tonnes of nickel, that is, 800,000 tonnes for a period of 20 years. Annual world nickel production is 925,000 tonnes (2003), of which 70% is consumed for stainless steels. The world s largest nickel-producing countries are Russia, Canada, New Caledonia, and Australia. In 2005, the major nickel projects were the laterite deposit of Goro (New Caledonia, France) and the sulfide ore deposit of Voise/s Bay (Newfoundland, Canada). 

The greatest field of application for nickel is austenitic stainless steels. This steel type and the influence of nickel are dealt with in Chapter 24 Chromium. Stainless-steel production accounted for more than 60% of the world nickel demand in the year 2000. The chemical industry is a very big consumer of nickel for a multitude of applications, mainly in stainless steels. In our everyday life we also meet nickel-containing, austenitic stainless steels in kitchen sinks, laundry equipment and cutlery, in railway cars and tank trailers. For the oil rigs offshore, with their exceptional corrosion problems, special stainless steels with high molybdenum contents, have been developed. 

Most world nickel production (>60%) is used in the making of stainless steels. Only approximately 13% of the world production of nickel is used in the manufacturing of nickel-based alloys. The most common nickel-based alloys are generally known by their commercial names such as Hastelloy, Inconel, Monel, and Incoloy alloys even though they all have a unique UNS number. For example, when people refer to Inconel alloy they are usually talking about the 600 series of alloys, for example alloy 600 (UNS N06600)or aUoy 625 (UNS N06625). 

Nickel is found as a constitutent in most meteorites and often serves as one of the criteria for distinguishing a meteorite from other minerals. Iron meteorites, or siderites, may contain iron alloyed with from 5 percent to nearly 20 percent nickel. Nickel is obtained commercially from pentlandite and pyrrhotite of the Sudbury region of Ontario, a district that produces about 30 percent of the world s supply of nicke. 

Rhodium occurs native with other platinum metals in river sands of the Urals and in North and South America. It is also found with other platinum metals in the copper-nickel sulfide area of the Sudbury, Ontario region. Although the quantity occurring here is very small, the large tonnages of nickel processed make the recovery commercially feasible. The annual world production of rhodium is only 7 or 8 tons. 

Steam Reformings of Natural Gas. This route accounts for at least 80% of the world s methanol capacity. A steam reformer is essentially a process furnace in which the endothermic heat of reaction is provided by firing across tubes filled with a nickel-based catalyst through which the reactants flow. Several mechanical variants are available (see Ammonia). 

Canada, Cuba, and Russia have the largest economic reserves, whereas the United States has less than 0.1% of the world s estimated reserves. Russia produced about 25%, Canada 22%, and New Caledonia 12% of the world s nickel in 1992. The United States produced less than 1% of the world s nickel in the same year. The net import rehance of the United States as a percent of apparent consumption remained about 75% over the period 1987—1992. 

Year World mine production, nickel content, t X 10 Average annual price, /kg Average constant price, /kg... 

The world economic (proven) nickel reserves are estimated at 47.0 x 10 t. At the 1992 world rate of mine production, these reserves would be expected to last at least until the year 2050. If, however, annual mine production increases at a rate that reflects a predicted increase in the world primary nickel consumption of 2% annually, these reserves would be depleted before 2030 (6,8,9). 

Uses. The sinter oxide form is used as charge nickel in the manufacture of alloy steels and stainless steels (see Steel). The oxide furnishes oxygen to the melt for decarburization and slagging. In 1993, >100, 000 metric tons of nickel contained in sinter oxide was shipped to the world s steel industry. Nickel oxide sinter is charged as a granular material to an electric furnace with steel scrap and ferrochrome the mixture is melted and blown with air to remove carbon as CO2. The melt is slagged, pouted into a ladle, the composition is adjusted, and the melt is cast into appropriate shapes. A modification of the use of sinter oxide is its injection directiy into the molten metal (33). 

The first commercial plant to use CYANEX 272 became operational in 1985. An additional three plants were constmcted between 1985 and 1989. Of the four, one is in South America and three in Europe. An additional three plants have been built two in Europe (1994) and one in North America (1995). Approximately 50% of the Western world s cobalt is processed using CYANEX 272. Both high purity salts and electrolytic cobalt metal are recovered from solutions ranging in composition from 30 g/L each of cobalt and nickel to 0.2 g/L Co, 95 g/L Ni Operating companies usually regard use of CYANEX 272 as confidential for competitive reasons and identities cannot be disclosed. CYANEX 272 is being evaluated on the pilot-plant scale in many additional projects involving the recovery of cobalt and other metals. 

Deposits. Selenium forms natural compounds with 16 other elements. It is a main constituent of 39 mineral species and a minor component of 37 others, chiefly sulfides. The minerals are finely disseminated and do not form a selenium ore. Because there are no deposits that can be worked for selenium recovery alone, there are no mine reserves. Nevertheless, the 1995 world reserves, chiefly in nonferrous metals sulfide deposits, are ca 70,000 metric tons and total resources are ca 130,000 t (24). The principal resources of the world are in the base metal sulfide deposits that are mined primarily for copper, zinc, nickel, and silver, and to a lesser extent, lead and mercury, where selenium recovery is secondary. 

In 1988, cadmium metal production in the United States increased significantly and imports decreased, but exports increased. Dramatic increases in cadmium prices in 1988 were attributed to the tight supply of cadmium worldwide, heavy speculative trading, and the large quantities of cadmium being purchased by the nickel—cadmium battery industry, particularly in Japan. About 30 countries are cadmium producers, led by Russia, Japan, the United States, Canada, Belgium, Germany, and Mexico, which cumulatively represented 64% of the 1988 reported world cadmium production of 19,773 metric tons. 

The bulk of synthetic industrial diamond production consists of the smaller crystal sizes up to 0.7-mm particle size (25 mesh). This size range has wide utihty in industry, and a significant fraction of the world s need for diamond abrasive grit is now met by synthetic production yielding thousands of kilograms per year. Because the raw materials are plentiful, synthetic production could, if necessary, supply the world demand for diamond abrasive. Development work continues in order to improve size and utility of the manufactured product and to realize the full potential of diamonds at minimum cost. An appreciable increase in performance has been obtained by coating the diamonds with a thin layer of nickel or copper, before incorporating them into wheels. The thin layer of metal apparendy improves adhesion and heat transfer. 

A U.S. Bureau of Mines survey covering 202 froth flotation plants in the United States showed that 198 million tons of material were treated by flotation in 1960 to recover 20 million tons of concentrates which contained approximately 1 billion in recoverable products. Most of the worlds copper, lead, zinc, molybdenum, and nickel are produced from ores that are concentrated first by flotation. In addition, flotation is commonly used for the recoveiy of fine coal and for the concentration of a wide range of mineral commodities including fluorspar, barite, glass sand, iron oxide, pyrite, manganese ore, clay, feldspar, mica, sponumene, bastnaesite, calcite, garnet, kyanite, and talc. 

More than 200 ores are known to contain cobalt but only a few are of commercial value. The more important are arsenides and sulfides such as smaltite, C0AS2, cobaltite (or cobalt glance), CoAsS, and linnaeite, C03S4. These are invariably associated with nickel, and often also with copper and lead, and it is usually obtained as a byproduct or coproduct in the recovery of these metals. The world s major sources of cobalt are the African continent and Canada with smaller reserves in Australia and the former USSR. All the platinum metals are generally associated with each other and rhodium and iridium therefore occur wherever the other platinum metals are found. However, the relative proportions of the individual metals are by no means constant and the more important sources of rhodium are the nickel-copper-sulfide ores found in South Africa and in Sudbury, Canada, which contain about 0.1% Rh. Iridium is usually obtained from native osmiridium (Ir 50%) or iridiosmium (Ir 70%) found chiefiy in Alaska as well as South Africa. 

Total world production of nickel is in the region of 1.0 million tonnes pa of which (1995) 25% comes from the former Soviet Union, 18% from Canada, 12% from New Caledonia and 10% from Australia. The bulk of this is used in the production of alloys both ferrous and non-ferrous. In 1889 J. Riley of Glasgow published a report on the effect of adding nickel to steel. This was noticed by the US Navy who initiated the use of nickel steels in armour plating. Stainless steels contain up to 8% Ni and the use of Alnico steel for permanent magnets has already been mentioned (p. 1114). 

The desire to replace cadmium is generally attributed to its toxicity, both in terms of process pollution and product corrosion, and several alternatives are feasible thicker zinc, tin-zinc alloy or tin-nickel alloy depending upon the precise application " . The demise of decorative nickel-chrome systems in the automotive industries of the world is partly due to cost and partly to market image, and not to technical performance where major improvements took place in the period 1960-1975 through the establishment of duplex nickel under-layers and micro discontinuous chromium top-layers. In the 1980s the trend has been towards black finishes produced generally by powder-applied epoxy polymers. 

In 1970, according to best estimates, 60 0001 of nickel coatings were deposited in the western world. This figure corresponds to 13% of the nickel consumed for all purposes. 

About 70% of the western world s supply of nickel comes from iron and nickel sulfide ores that were brought close to the surface nearly 2 billion years ago by the violent impact of a huge meteor at Sudbury, Ontario. The ore is first roasted (heated in air) to form nickel(II) oxide, which is reduced to the metal either elec-trolytically or by reaction with hydrogen gas in the first step of the Mond process ... 

Scientists from Politecnico di Milano and Ineos Vinyls UK developed a tubular fixed-bed reactor comprising a metallic monolith [30]. The walls were coated with catalytically active material and the monolith pieces were loaded lengthwise. Corning, the world leader in ceramic structured supports, developed metallic supports with straight channels, zig-zag channels, and wall-flow channels. They were produced by extrusion of metal powders, for example, copper, fin, zinc, aluminum, iron, silver, nickel, and mixtures and alloys [31]. An alternative method is extrusion of softened bulk metal feed, for example, aluminum, copper, and their alloys. The metal surface can be covered with carbon, carbides, and alumina, using a CVD technique [32]. For metal monoliths, it is to be expected that the main resistance lies at the interface between reactor wall and monolith. Corning... 

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