ANALYSIS OF THE OPTIMISATION PROCESS OF CYANIDE BIODEGRADATION AND TOTAL SUSPENDED SOLID BIOFLOCCULATION FROM THE GOLD EXTRACTION TAILING RUNOFFS

• Main Author: Arfani Rahman, Hanif
• Format: Theses
• Language: Indonesia
• Online Access: https://digilib.itb.ac.id/gdl/view/67925
• Institution: Institut Teknologi Bandung

Gold is one of the metals that is widely used because of its valuable properties, and one of the gold extraction processes that has been proven optimal is the cyanidation method. This method uses cyanide-based reagents to leach the gold from the ore so that it can be separated from the mineral impurities which will become tailings. These tailings will be collected at the tailings dam and still contain cyanide and Total Suspended Solid (TSS) which are difficult to settle. Tailings dams can be full and overflow due to external sources such as rainwater containing cyanide and TS which will pollute the environment, so further treatment is needed. This experiment was conducted to determine the role of bacteria, in the cyanide biodegradation and TSS bioflocculation process in gold extraction tailings runoff. The experiment began with a literature study to determine various types of bacteria and their mechanisms in the cyanide biodegradation and TSS bioflocculation process. The experiment was started by conducting a pre-experiment to determine the optimal time for cyanide biodegradation and TSS bioflocculation from selected bacteria. Then proceed with a preliminary experiment to determine the most optimal type of bacteria that can perform the cyanide biodegradation as well as TSS bioflocculation process. Subsequently, the core experiment with the optimal bacteria was conducted by varying the variables, i.e. initial concentration of cyanide, inoculum size of bacteria, and volume of sample. Variation of this variable was selected to determine the most optimal conditions in the cyanide biodegradation and TSS bioflocculation process. The results showed that the most optimal bacteria for cyanide biodegradation and TSS bioflocculation process is Lysinibacillus fusiformis strain SKC-8 with a cyanide degradation rate of 0.7904 ppm/hour, a TSS bioflocculation rate of 10.1549 ppm/minute, and final pH of 7,6.