Method for extraction of uranium from ores

US4361541A · kind A · utility

Assignees

• Vereinigte Aluminum - Werke Aktiengesellschaft · DE
• Metallgesellschaft AG · DE

Inventors

• Hubert Bings · Grafenau, DE
• Fritz Kampf · Grafenau, DE
• Roland Thome · Bonn, DE
• Gerhard Wargalla · Grafenau, DE
• Gunter Winkhaus · Rübhausen, DE
• Hartmut Pietsch · Bad Homburg vor der Höhe, DE
• Wolfgang Turke · Schöneck, DE
• Peter Fischer

Key dates

• Filing date: Sep 4, 1979
• Grant date: Nov 30, 1982
• Expiry date: Sep 4, 1999

Classification

• Technology area (CPC C): Chemistry; Metallurgy
• CPC primary: C01P2006/80
• WIPO field: Materials, metallurgy
• WIPO sector: Chemistry

Abstract

A method for continuously extracting uranium from ores comprises the steps of forming a slurry of ore in a leaching solution; heating the slurry while pumping it through a tube reactor at high turbulences characterized by Reynolds numbers in excess of 50,000; supplying gaseous oxygen at high pressures of at least 30 bar into the tube reactor such that the uranium is substantially completely oxidized in a soluble form but impurities in the slurry are substantially kept from becoming soluble; recovering the uranium oxide solute which is substantially free of impurities.