Method of extracting zinc from brines

An improved method of extracting zinc from an aqueous brine containing a mixture of salts and other elements including Zn, Fe and Mn, wherein the method comprises the steps of (1) contacting the aqueous brine with a selected organic extractant to remove Zn from the brine, producing an organic extractant loaded with Zn;

• (2) scrubbing the loaded organic extractant with a dilute acidified brine to remove co-extracted Fe and Mn from the loaded organic extractant, producing a scrubbed organic extractant containing Zn;
• and (3) stripping the Zn from the scrubbed organic extractant with a solution of ammonia and a suitable salt to produce a stripped organic layer and a concentrated and purified aqueous Zn strip solution having a Zn concentration of at least 10 g/L, the improvement comprising the steps of:
• (4) reacting the aqueous Zn strip solution of step (3) with a base or precipitant at elevated temperatures to precipitate the Zn from the strip solution as Zn(OH).sub.2 or ZnCO.sub.3 and release ammonia for recycle to step (3);
• (5) washing the stripped organic layer of step (3) with neutral salt solution to remove ammonia from the organic layer;
• and optionally acidifying and recycling the organic layer to step (1);
• (6) filtering and recovering the Zn(OH).sub.2 or ZnCO.sub.3 from step (4) and recycling the salt-washed stripped organic layer solution back to step (3).