COBALT CAPTURE

While the cobalt in platinum group metals (PGM) ore is destroyed in during conventional PGM processing, the new Kell technology can put an end to all that. The lower temperature hydrometallurgical process developed by the Pallinghurst group saves cobalt from destruction at a time when the cobalt price is set for a good run and the platinum-mining business is in need of every co-product credit it can lay its hands on. Kell also reduces mining-to-refining time to a week instead of a month plus, uses less than a fifth of the electricity needed for smelting, replaces a smelting plant that costs $1-billion with a modular hydrometallurgical plant that costs $100-million, widens mining scope by throwing chrome-ore content caution to the wind and eliminates all pungent and toxic sulphur dioxide emissions. Just what the doctor ordered for the slumping PGMs business.