Phosphoric Acid → Phosphoric Acid

Participants

Reaction Steps

In the production of phosphoric acid by the wet process, a phosphatic material, usually phosphate rock, is acidulated with an acid, e.g. a mineral acid notably sulphuric acid, to give phosphoric acid and calcium sulphate. In the gypsum process the calcium sulphate is precipitated as gypsum, which is separated off from the phosphoric acid, e.g. on a rotary tilting pan filter. The filter cake usually retains some of the phosphoric acid thereon and this is recovered by washing the filter cake with water. However, problems are often encountered due to poor filtration of the gypsum from the phosphoric acid and/or poor washability of the gypsum filter cake. Poor filtration leads to a lower throughput of material through a given filter area, and poor washability leads to high P2O5 losses from the reaction system.

Provenance & Evidence