Ilmenites are important minerals used as a source for TiO₂ (white pigment) production. Ilmenites originated from Norway, India, China and Australia are frequently being used in industrial technological processes. This raw material i mainly used in titanium dioxide production by sulphate method. This method requires the knowledge about elemental and phase composition for adjusting the efficiency and the safety of kinetics of the reaction. The main phases which involved Ti and Fe are known but content and chemical states of other elements is also important because of their impact on quality of the final product. In the presented paper Mg based phases were studied in minerals listed above. To characterize these minerals we have applied X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and single particle electron probe microanalysis (SPEPMA). From the performed SPEPMA and XRD measurements it results that Mg phases constituted quite substantial part of investigated minerals. The Mg chemical states were evaluated by applying the principal components analysis of X-ray absorption K-spectra of Mg (XANDA code was used). The spectra were measured at BEESY beamline UE52PGM. The Mg was found in three chemical compounds MgTiO₃, MgSiO₃ and Mg(OH)₂. The content of the particular phases depends on the place were minerals were collected. These foundings were the starting point in Rietvield analysis of diffraction data and they were compared with the results from SPEPMA cluster analysis.

This work was partially supported by European Community under Contract

RII3-CT-2004-506008 (IA-SFS).