Anodic coal reaction lowers energy consumption of metal electrowinning

THE metals which can be extracted in large amounts from aqueous solutions of their salts by electrowinning are Cr, Mn, Co, Ni, Cu, Zn, Ga, Cd, In and Tl. Gilroy 1 specifies an annual electrowinning production for 1971 of 2,400,000 tons of Zn and 540,000 tons of Ca, 53% and 10% respectively of total production at that time. We describe here a modification to the established electrowinning technique which lowers the energy consumption of the process.