Design and fabrication of an electric powered activated carbon thermal regeneration kiln for small scale gold miners :

Abstract

Granular activated carbon methods that purify water or recover precious metals depend on the carbon’s ability to be reused in numerous adsorption regeneration cycles in order to be economically viable. To revive the activity of a used-up (exhausted) activated carbon, various methods, both chemical and physical, have been employed and developed. When only one or a few specific adsorbates need to be removed or recovered from spent carbon, a variety of chemical techniques can successfully restore its activity. In these situations, the proper solvents and/or chemicals are applied to specifically desorb the in-question adsorbates. Biochemical regeneration, however, can only partially activate carbon that has been loaded with a heterogeneous combination of adsorbates, like those that are typically present in industrial process streams or effluents. (Rogans & Director, 2012) have pointed out that, while chemical regeneration may restore sufficient activity to the carbon for a few cycles of effective operation, comprehensive thermal regeneration must be applied at regular intervals to restore complete activity. Thermal regeneration effectively restores the activity of carbons loaded with organic adsorbates. In Uganda, thermal regeneration is too expensive, making it difficult for small-scale gold processors to use it. At the moment, no facility in Uganda is entirely dedicated to the thermal regeneration of used activated carbon for gold processing industries despite its proved high efficiency. These people have used crude regeneration techniques in this instance. These procedures take a lot of time, are completely ineffective, and are risky for the operators. In order to address the issue that has impeded Uganda’s gold production, this project will be restricted to designing and building an electric powered activated carbon thermal regeneration kiln that is effective, affordable, clean, and time-friendly. KEY WORDS: granular activated carbon, exhaustion, thermal regeneration, electric kiln