Developing Approaches to Creating a Resource-Saving Technology for the Recovery of Valuable Components (Ultra-Pure Graphite, Diamondlike Carbon, and Strategic Metals) from High-Carbon Rocks

Abstract

New prospective sources of valuable minerals, including substantial reserves of crystalline graphite, gold, platinum, rare earth elements, and diamondlike carbon, have been revealed by the authors in high-carbon rocks in the south of Russia’s Far East. A scheme has been developed for the hydrometallurgical recovery of strategic metals and extra-pure (99.98%) crystalline graphite, used as a base material for conducting plasma-chemical investigations, from graphite ore. As a result of the experiment, nanodiamonds have been recovered, which were presumably inherited from the natural graphite-containing rocks.