Sustainable Mining and Metallurgy

High-salinity effluent produced from Chinese non-ferrous metals metallurgical plants are difficult to degrade as it has a high ion concentration and hardness. Its conventional treatment methods, such as multi-effect evaporation, has typical issues including scaling and high energy consumption. The article first summarized sources of exhaust steam and high-salinity effluent from non-ferrous metal metallurgical plants in China, then described two commercial applications of the ENFI-LTE process, and calculated their operation costs and carbon-emission reduction contribution. By treating effluent with waste heat in a short process, with low energy consumption, no softener added, and giving a high concentration factor and water quality, the ENFI-LTE technology is highly efficient, and conducive to energy saving and carbon-emission mitigation.