| Copper ores often contain very low concentrations of the metal. Because of this, many stages of the production process focus on eliminating impurities. The ore is crushed and milled before entering a flotation chamber, in which copper will concentrate at the top while unwanted fragments sink. Next, the concentrate, now called charge, will enter a reverberatory furnace, where more impurities are removed. During smelting, waste gases are removed, and the material forms a molten pool of copper and iron, called the matte, at the bottom of the furnace. The orange layer of impure metal on top of the matte is slag, which is drained off while the copper matte continues on to a converter. Molten copper from the converter is cast and must be refined once more by electrolysis before it is ready for use in the manufacture of products such as electrical wire and utensils. |
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