Milling of new Indian uranium ores: issues and approaches

The vision statement of DAE enunciate 10-fold rise in production of uranium by 2030 for partial fulfillment of fuel requirements of the nuclear power reactors. Achieving the ambitious target needs multi-pronged approach like augmentation of capacities of existing mines and mills, opening-up of new resources along with processing facilities besides improvising the operational efficiency of existing plants using newer technologies. The reported in situ uranium resources of India at present are about 2 lakh tons spread across various geological environments. Practically all the explored uranium resources, both the existing and the new deposits, are confronted with unique challenges with respect to mining and milling. Some of the issues pertaining to milling include lean and complex nature of uranium mineralization, presence of reactive gangue minerals, limited availability of water, proximity to water bodies and inhabitations etc. Since every uranium ore is unique in nature tailor made processes needs to be developed for each of them. This presentation discusses more details on the above aspects