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How to Separate Copper & Nickel

Copper is almost always present in nickel-bearing ore, and nickel is often found in copper-bearing ore. As part of the process of smelting and refining, industrial operations will separate the two metals rather than end up with an alloy of both. Metallurgists have several systems for extracting copper from nickel and vice versa, but none of them are cheap and research on better methods continues.

Things You'll Need

Ore bearing a nickel-copper mix
Blast or reverberatory furnace

Instructions

Prepare the Ore
- 1
  
  Mining is only the first step.
  
  Mine the ore, crush it and grind it, then use flotation to separate out the worthless material from the valuable metals. This will leave a concentrate typically consisting of 5 to 20 percent copper and 2 and 10 percent nickel.
- 2
  Smelt the concentrate in a blast or reverberatory furnace. The smelted material is defined by metallurgists as a matte.
- 3
  Cool the matte, which will form into particles of nickel sulfide, copper sulfide and a metallic fraction. The metals can then be recovered by a combination of crushing, grinding, flotation and magnetic separation.
- 4
  Leach one or both of the metals from the matte as an alternative treatment. Acid leaching can be used to dissolve and separate out the copper, or the matte can be oxidized in order to leach out the nickel.

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