Alternatives for the Production of Potassium Fertilizers in Argentina

SILVANA VALDEZ; BLANCA ABREGU; AGUSTINA ORCE; LEUNG KWOK

journal of agricultural science and food research

Longdom Group

Año: 2020 vol. 11

2593-9173

The use of potassium fertilizers on crops brings with good yields of crops and maximum profitability for farmers.Currently in Argentina, the level of production of potash fertilizers does not cover the needs of the sector making itnecessary to import to meet demand. On the other hand, the brines of the Puna, which are exploited to producelithium carbonate, contain potassium chloride in appreciable concentrations and could be an alternative resource toobtain potassium fertilizer. The aim of this paper is to analyse the possibilities of obtaining potassium fertilizers inthe NOA, using both, natural brines and process effluents of obtaining lithium carbonate. Industrially, KCl isobtained by froth flotation and fractionated crystallization. Nowadays, salting-out is not applied industrially to obtainKCl. Through salting-out, KCl crystallization is achieved by adding an organic solvent that modifies KCl solubility. Inthis work, the three techniques mentioned are compared, focusing on performance, recovery and purity of thecrystals obtained. The solids obtained by flotation have purity between 85-90% while by fractionated crystallizationthe purity of the solids is higher than 95% as in the crystals obtained by salting-out. These results show that the KClobtained can be used as a fertilizer since it meets the specifications for use as suchKeywords: Potassium; Fertilizers; Brines; Residues