Available online at www.sciencedirect.com ScienceDirect Procedia Environmental Sciences 31 (2016 ) 653 661 The Tenth International Conference on Waste Management and Technology (ICWMT) Synthesis and characterization of micaceous iron oxide pigment from oily cold rolling mill sludge Bo Liu a, Shen-gen Zhang a,*, De-an Pan a, Chein-chi Chang b a Insititute for advanced Materials and Technology, University of Science and Technology, Beijing, Beijing 10083, China b University of Maryland, Baltimore Country 21252, USA Abstract Oily cold rolling mill (CRM) sludge is a kind of solid waste produced in production process of cold rolled strip. In China, more than one hundred thousand tons of oily CRM sludge is produced each year. The oily CRM sludge contains lots of valuable iron and alloying elements, along with plenty of hazardous organic components, which makes it an attractive secondary resource and an environmental contaminant at the same time. At present, oily CRM sludge is mainly used as smelting raw materials. Its direct re-use in sintering may lead to some problems because high oil content of oily CRM sludge results in increased emission of volatile organic compounds including dioxins and can lead to problems in waste gas purification systems, e.g. glow fires in electrostatic precipitators. In this paper, micaceous iron oxide (MIO) pigment was synthesized from oily CRM sludge by means of the multi-step processes, including acid leaching, preparation of the ferric hydroxide precursor and hydrothermal synthesis. The experimental conditions, including NaOH concentration and hydrothermal reaction temperature were investigated in order to determine the optimal ones. The morphology and particle size of as-prepared MIO pigment were characterized by means of X- ray diffraction (XRD) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM), respectively. The results showed that the obtained pigment had high purity (~98.7%) and good oil absorption (~18.8%). The synthesized MIO pigments met the required characteristics of MIO pigments for paints (ISO10601-2007). MIO pigments synthesis method presents a viable alternative for oily CRM sludge recycling. 2016 2015 The The Authors. Authors. Published Published by Elsevier by Elsevier B.V This B.V. is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer-review under responsibility of Tsinghua University/ Basel Convention Regional Centre for Asia and the Pacific. Peer-review under responsibility of Tsinghua University/ Basel Convention Regional Centre for Asia and the Pacific Keywords: Oily cold rolling mill sludge; Micaceous iron oxide pigment; Hydrothermal method; Recycling * Corresponding author. Tel.: +86-10-62333375; fax: +86-10-62333375. E-mail address: zhangshengen@mater.ustb.edu.cn. 1878-0296 2016 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer-review under responsibility of Tsinghua University/ Basel Convention Regional Centre for Asia and the Pacific doi:10.1016/j.proenv.2016.02.121
654 Bo Liu et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 31 ( 2016 ) 653 661 Introduction Everyday significant quantities of solid waste materials, such as oily cold rolling mill (CRM) sludge are generated by the iron and steel plants. The oily CRM sludge, resulted from cold rolling processes, is a mixture of small metal particles, cooling fluids, lubricants, etc. Since the oily CRM sludge contains lots of valuable iron and alloying elements, it is considered an attractive secondary source [1]. Recycling of these wastes can not only reduce pollution and protect the environment, but also allow their reutilization. Nowadays, oily CRM sludge is mainly recycled as raw materials in the secondary smelt furnaces [2-3]. The processing method has some advantages, such as high treatment efficiency and low cost, but an unavoidable problem is that high oil content of oily CRM sludge results in increased emission of volatile organic compounds, including dioxins, and can lead to problems in waste gas purification systems, e.g. glow fires in electrostatic precipitators. Therefore, developing new clean technologies for recycling valuable resources from oily CRM sludge is of great significance. Iron oxide pigment is widely used in coatings, construction materials, pigments and other applications, due to its chemical stability, non-toxicity, long durability and low costs [4-6]. Thus far, the use of solid waste containing iron in iron oxide preparations has become a hot research topic [7-10], because it can potentially save nature resources and improve added value of waste recycling. Micaceous iron oxide (MIO) is a type of hematite (α-fe 2O 3). Given its unique flake structure and better performance, MIO is currently one of the best antirust pigment and anticorrosive medium in industrial anticorrosion coatings. Numerous synthetic routes have been employed to synthesize MIO, including high temperature molten salt [11], vapor phase [12], hydrothermal method [13-16], etc. Compared with other methods, hydrothermal method is a low-cost technique and suitable for the mass production. If oily CRM sludge could be used to produce high-quality MIO pigment, it could increase the value of the products, benefiting the environment and the society. However, there are few reports concerning the preparation of MIO pigment from oily CRM sludge. In the present study, an attempt has been made to prepare MIO pigment by oily CRM sludge via a multi-steps process, including acid leaching, preparation of the ferric hydroxide precursor, and hydro-thermal reaction. The factors affecting quality of the MIO pigment were studied in order to obtain the optimal ones. The results showed that MIO pigment could be prepared by using oily CRM sludge. 2. Experiments 2.1 Materials and regents All reagents used in this study were of analytical grade and locally procured. The oily CRM sludge used in this study was obtained from the Baosteel Group Corporation in Shanghai Province, China. The main chemical composition is given in Table 1. Fig. 1 shows the XRD patterns of the oily CRM sludge sample dried at 100 C. Maghemite (Fe 2O 3) and pure iron (Fe) were identified to be the most abundant iron phases. Table 1. Chemical analysis of the oily CRM sludge dried in air. Component Content (wt. %) Fe 70.60 Ni 0.05 Mn 0.18 Cr 0.07 Si 0.06 V 0.02 Oil and moisture 18.20 Other 10.82
Bo Liu et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 31 ( 2016 ) 653 661 655 Fig.1. XRD patterns of the oily CRM sludge dried at 100 C. 2.2 Preparation of the MIO pigment MIO powders were prepared through a multi-step process, including acid leaching, preparation of the ferric hydroxide precursor, and the hydrothermal reaction. The experimental flow chart is given in Fig. 2. Acid leaching Oily CRM sludge Mixed solution of Fe 2(SO 4) 3 and FeSO 4 Hydrogen peroxide Fe 2(SO 4) 3 solution Drop slowly Ammonia solution Stirring Ferric hydroxide precursor NaOH solution Hydrothermal reaction MIO pigment powders Fig.2. Processing steps for MIO pigment powders synthesized from the oily CRM sludge. First, oily CRM sludge used as raw materials was leached in 6 mol/l of sulfuric acid (H 2SO 4) solution at 85 C for 4 hours, with magnetic stirring. After leaching, the mixtures were filtered many times to separate the oil parts. The separated oil was reused as fuel or chemical feedstock for further processing, and the filter liquor was oxidized by hydrogen peroxide (30 wt. %). Iron components in the oily CRM sludge became iron sulfate, Fe 2(SO 4) 3, after this extra chemical treatment. Then, ammonia (NH 3 H 2O) was added to the oxidized solution with magnetic stirring, until solution ph reached about 7. The obtained precipitate was filtered after the solution was continuously stirred for 1 h using magnetic stirring. The resulting red brown precipitate was then mixed into sodium hydroxide (NaOH) solution (heated to 60 C in water bath) at a solid to liquid ratio of 1:12. After mechanical stirring, a homogeneous
656 Bo Liu et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 31 ( 2016 ) 653 661 mixture of ferric hydroxide and hydrated alkali was obtained. The mixture was then poured into a 100 ml Teflonlined reaction kettle at a certain temperature for 2 h. After allowing reactor to cool down to room temperature, obtained MIO was separated from suspension by centrifugation, washed with water and dried at 80 C overnight. The effects of experimental factors, including NaOH concentration and reaction temperature were investigated. 2.3 Analytical methods X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis was performed using Philips APD-10 X-ray diffractometer with Cu Kα radiation, 40 kv voltage and 150 ma current at 10 /min scanning rate, from 10 to 100. The morphology and mean particle size were observed in the scanning electron microscope (Zeiss EVO-18, Germany). Chemical analysis of the liquids was performed to examine the ferrous and ferric ion concentrations, according to the GB/T 1863-2008 (China Industrial Standard). The results were the mean values of the two experiments using the same sample. The oil absorption of hydrothermal products was measured according to the ISO10601-2007 standard. 3. Results and discussion 3.1. Effect of NaOH concentration To study the effect of NaOH concentration on the MIO pigment characteristics, a series of experiments were performed with NaOH concentration ranging from 2 to 12 mol/l when hydrothermal temperature was fixed at 200 C. The morphology characteristics, content of Fe 2O 3 and oil absorption of MIO pigment prepared under different NaOH concentrations were given in Table 2. According to Table 2, it was observed that the pigment color turned from lemon-yellow to purple with the increase of NaOH concentration in the 2-4 mol/l range. However, when NaOH concentration reached 6 mol/l, the color became metallic gray. Table 2. Characteristic parameters of MIO powders prepared at different NaOH concentration. NaOH concentration (mol/l) Color Morphology Content of Fe 2O 3(wt. %) Oil absorption (wt. %) 2 Lemon-yellow Ellipsoid - 45.6 4 Purple Platelet 86.2 31.2 6 Metallic gray Flake 98.4 27.8 8 Metallic gray Flake 98.7 18.8 10 Metallic gray Flake 98.8 18.6 12 Metallic gray Flake 99.0 18.3 Fig.3 showed the XRD patterns of pigments obtained at different NaOH concentrations. The 2 mol/l sample had a principal α-feooh phase (JCPDS No.29-0713), while other samples had a pure α-fe 2O 3 structure (JCPDS No.89-0596). In alkaline medium with lower concentration (2 mol/l), the iron hydroxide precursors generated α-feooh by hydrothermal reaction, consistent with many research results [17-19]. When the sodium hydroxide concentration increased to 4 mol/l, the phase transformation from goethite to hematite occurred through the dissolution/ recrystallization mechanism [20, 21]. It may be attributed to the increase of the FeOOH solubility with NaOH concentration.
Bo Liu et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 31 ( 2016 ) 653 661 657 Fig.3. XRD patterns of MIO prepared at different NaOH concentrations. The SEM micrographs in Fig.4 showed the morphologies of the products synthesized at different NaOH concentrations. The morphology of the obtained products changed from ellipsoid to platelet, and then to flake with increasing NaOH concentration.
658 Bo Liu et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 31 ( 2016 ) 653 661 Fig.4. SEM images of MIO synthesized at different NaOH concentrations: (a) 2 mol/l; (b) 4 mol/l; (c) 6 mol/l; (d) 8 mol/l; (e) 10 mol/l; (f) 12 mol/l. In addition, Table 3 also showed that the pigment obtained at 8 mol/l had a high purity (98.7%) and good oil absorption (18.8%). Taking into account all the above discussed results and economic factors, the optimal NaOH concentration was 8 mol/l. Under this condition, the synthesized MIO pigments had uniform flake shape and good crystalline form. 3.2. Effect of hydrothermal temperature To study the effect of hydrothermal temperature, a series of experiments were performed at different hydrothermal temperatures, ranging from 140 to 240 C when NaOH concentration was fixed at 8 mol/l. The corresponding characteristic parameters were summarized in Table 3, which showed that the color of obtained products changed from dark brown, purple to purple gray and then to metallic gray with increasing reaction temperature, and the iron oxide content increased with the reaction temperature. Table 3. Characteristic parameters of MIO powders prepared at different reaction temperature. Reaction temperature ( C) Color Morphology Content of Fe 2O 3(wt. %) Oil absorption (wt. %) 140 Dark brown Ellipsoid 71.9 48.3 160 Purple Flake 84.1 27.8 180 Purple gray Flake 97.8 20.2 200 Metallic gray Flake 98.7 18.8 220 Metallic gray Flake 98.7 18.3 240 Metallic gray Flake 99.1 17.6 Fig.5 showed the XRD patterns of the products obtained at different reaction temperatures. From Fig.5, it was observed that diffraction peak intensity of obtained products matched with the standard α-fe 2O 3 reflections. Compared with other samples, 140 C sample had more fuzzy diffraction peaks and lower diffraction intensity, indicating that the degree of crystallinity of the 140 C sample was far lower than the other samples. This was because ferric hydroxide precursor could not be transferred to α-fe 2O 3 completely at 140 C, which also helped to explain why α-fe 2O 3 content of the 140 C sample was less than the others. Therefore, reaction temperature played an important role in the formation of α-fe 2O 3 crystals, and higher temperature aided ferric hydroxide precursor transfer to α-fe 2O 3.
Bo Liu et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 31 ( 2016 ) 653 661 659 Fig.5. XRD patterns of MIO prepared at different reaction temperatures. Fig.6 presented SEM micrographs of MIO powders prepared at different reaction temperatures. From Fig.6 (a), products synthesized at 140 C exhibited amorphous and serious agglomeration, indicating that ferric hydroxide precursor could not be transferred to α-fe 2O 3 completely at 140 C. This result was consistent with the XRD analysis. When the temperature rose to 160 C, the amount of amorphous powder in the product was greatly reduced. When reaction temperature was higher than 180 C, the obtained products were uniform flakes and their particle size increased with the reaction temperature.
660 Bo Liu et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 31 ( 2016 ) 653 661 Fig.6. SEM images of MIO synthesized at different reaction temperatures: (a) 140 C; (b) 160 C; (c) 180 C; (d) 200 C; (e) 220 C; (d) 240 C. Taking into accounts all these results, along with the economic factors, the optimal hydrothermal reaction temperature was 200 C. 3.3. Properties of the synthesized MIO To sum up the above discussion, optimal parameters of MIO synthesized from oily CRM sludge were: 8 mol/l sodium hydroxide concentration, 200 C reaction temperature. MIO pigments prepared under the optimal parameters were evaluated according to the international standard ISO 10601-2007, and the results were shown in Table 4. Synthesized MIO pigments met the required characteristics of MIO pigments for paints (ISO10601-2007). Table 4. Quality of MIO synthesized from oily CRM sludge under optimal conditions. Characteristic ISO 10601-2007 (Grade A) Synthesized sample Thin-flake content (wt. %) 65 85 Iron content, expressed as Fe 2O 3 (wt. %) 85 98.7 Oil absorption value (wt. %) 13-19 18.8 Matter solubility in water (wt. %) 0.5 0.28 Matter volatility at 105 C (wt. %) 0.5 0.43 ph of aqueous suspension 6-8 7.76 Residue on sieve (wt. %) 5 (63 μm), 0.1 (105 μm) 0 4. Conclusions MIO pigment powders were successfully prepared using oily CRM sludge as raw materials by means of the multi-step processes consisting of acid leaching, preparation of ferric hydroxide precursor and hydrothermal synthesis. The optimum technological parameters are 8 mol/l sodium hydroxide concentration and 200 C reaction temperature. Under optimized conditions, the as-synthesized MIO is uniform flake, metallic gray, and has a high purity high purity of about 98.7%. Moreover, prepared MIO can meet the required characteristics of MIO pigments for paints (ISO10601-2007). MIO pigments synthesis method presents a viable alternative for oily CRM sludge recycling. Acknowledgements This work was supported by the National Key Project of Scientific and Technical Supporting Programs funded by the Ministry of Science and Technology of China (Grants 2012BAC02B01, 2012BAC12B05, 2011BAE13B07 and 2011BAC10B02), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grants U1360202, 51472030 and 51502014), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (Project No: FRF-TP-14-043A1) and China
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