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By R Beaulieu, D Burlingame, C Hanks

The Ekati Diamond MineÖ is CanadaÆs first diamond mine and is located 300 kilometres northeast of Yellowknife in the Northwest Territories. The development of the mine supports sustainable development through the integration of environmental, economic and social considerations with the broad aim of minimising environmental impacts while maximising opportunities and benefits to northern residents and northern businesses. The environmental assessment and regulatory processes for the Ekati Diamond MineÖ were the most extensive seen in the NWT to that date; in Canada only uranium mines receive more attention. In addition to the regulatory requirements, an Environmental Agreement was negotiated with the Governments of Canada and the Northwest Territories to address environmental concerns not covered by existing legislation and regulation. Under the agreement an Independent Environmental Monitoring Agency was set up to oversee the regulatory process and implementation of the Environmental Agreement. Environmental stewardship is implemented through an Operational Environmental Management Plan, part of which includes effects monitoring programs for wildlife and aquatics where available traditional ecological and scientific knowledge are integrated to broaden our understanding of the tundra environment. A Socio-economic Agreement was concluded with the Government of the Northwest Territories to maximise employment and business benefits to the north. Voluntary and confidential Impact Benefits Agreements (IBAs) were also negotiated with four Aboriginal groups who use the area where the mine is located. The intention of the IBAs is to foster development initiatives and a partnership thereby helping to insure that benefits from the project flowed to the Aboriginal groups despite a lack of settled land claims in the region. All these were completed before commercial production in October 1998. Employment targets of 62 per cent residents of the Northwest Territories and 31 per cent Northern Aboriginal have consistently been met thereby ensuring benefits flow to residents of the Northwest Territories. In 2000, $316 million was spent to support operations at the Ekati Diamond MineÖ. Of this, 82.2 per cent of total spending and 26.6 per cent total northern spending was northern and northern Aboriginal businesses, respectively. The environmental and socio-economic monitoring results are reported annually to the responsible government agencies and potentially affected Aboriginal groups. To date, there have not been any significant adverse environmental effects documented and socio-economic targets have been met.

Jan 1, 2002

In this study, a 3D model of the shovel motion based multi-body system dynamics in the Automatic Dynamic Analysis of Mechanical Systems (ADAMS) environment was developed. The kinematics model of the shovel was modeled as a multi-body system, which comprises the lower, upper, and the attachment mechanisms. The Euler-Lagrangian equations were employed as the computational framework to describe the dynamic behavior of the model. A virtual prototype of the shovel was built in the ADAMS software environment. This environment allows the visualization of a 3D motion of the general mechanical system and the prediction of interference of the moving components of the shovel. The numerical analysis and animation of digging, swinging and dumping motions for the shovel were performed. The superimposed display of the deployment for the shovel in three phases allows a detailed examination of the dynamic interference among assembly components. This research provides a solid foundation for further shovel dynamics performance studies. Keywords: Shovel, Spatial Kinematics, Virtual Prototype, Visualization

Jan 1, 2009

By Dan L'Heureux, Joe Haid, Stephen H. Chung

Most coal deposits in Western Canada involve steeply dipping multiple seams. An efficient way to recover coal seams would be to drill through the seams and blast both the overlying and underlying waste material in one shot without disrupting the coal seams while fragmenting the waste rock for easy removal. This requires special blasting techniques as reported by Chung and Jorgenson in 1985.

Jan 1, 1998

The reality of rising electrical power costs and the haunting prospect of decreasing electrical power availability are a threat to the growth of new projects and expansion programmes that could negatively affect the sustainability of mining operations. These threats require the adoption of effective power saving measures aimed at three principal objectives: the elimination of wastage, the reduction of power usage particularly during peak demand periods and, more importantly, improving the efficiency of high power-demand processes. It is reasonable to assume that the greatest impact will be achieved by concentrating on those processes that are large electrical power consumers. For Anglo Platinum operations, mine ventilation and, currently to a lesser extent, mine cooling are two continuous processes that fall in this category. It is estimated that these may consume fifteen to thirty-five per cent of the power delivered to the shaft head-depending on the shaft's design. Mine ventilation systems suffer from inherent, historical inefficiencies that lead to excessive power consumption. Air cooling systems are designed to be energy-wise in terms of modulating refrigeration plant operation to meet the underground requirements while maximizing use of 'free' cooling from surface conditions. Currently about ninety-five per cent of the refrigeration capacity used in Anglo Platinum mines is dedicated to surface bulk air coolers. The net thermal efficiency of these systems is compromised as mines expand in depth and on strike. Looking to the future, this practice will be complemented by more energy demanding underground cooling tactics requiring considerably higher electrical power consumption per unit ton produced. To counter this increase in power consumption, more energy-efficient systems and advantageous transient strategies such as thermal storage and the use of ice-on surface and possibly even underground-are being considered. This paper describes work currently undertaken and planned by Anglo Platinum operations to reduce power consumption by main fans during off-shift periods, the associated efforts currently introduced to reduce underground air leakage, the possibility of introducing more efficient auxiliary ventilation systems, the feasibility of thermal storage, and a brief look at energy recovery system as a means of countering the anticipated power demand associated with underground cooling. Keywords Mine ventilation, mine air cooling, energy efficiency, chilled service water, energy recovery, air wastage, fan selection.

Jan 1, 2011

By Richard F. Lynch, Frank E. Goodwin

"The development of Galfan, a new generation 95% zinc-5% aluminum-mischmetal alloy coating for steel, offers opportunities for greater fabrication flexibility and upgraded corrosion performance in automotive applications. The formability of Galfan is equivalent to that of electrogalvanized steel, based on laboratory tests and automotive component fabrication. Corrosion resistance of Galfan exceeds that of hot dip and electrogalvanized, including performance in automotive industry tests. Automotive production applications for deep drawn and stamped components in France and Germany are based on the ability to meet dual performance requirements for upgraded formability and corrosion resistance. The first U.S. Galfan application was on 1985 model Ford cars and light trucks for transmission oil cooler lines which has now expanded into a number of power steering tubing uses. IntroductionContinuing requirements for improved vehicle performance coupled with the ever present need for reduced cost have spawned the development of a number of new coated steel products. Among this new generation of coated steels is Gaifan™, a 95070 zinc-Solo aluminum-mischmetal hot dip alloy coating. Galfan exhibits particular promise for automotive use based on broad fabrication advantages and upgraded product performance(I ),The unique characteristic of Galfan is the key combination of greatly improved formability with much longer corrosion life. Galfan provides significantly better formability than any other hot dip coating. Testing shows that formability is limited primarily by the steel substrate to which the Galfan coating is applied. Galfan exhibits excellent resistance to flaking and microcracking during commercial forming operations. The result is the elimination of unnoticed damage to the coating which would show up later as premature rusting on the finished product."

Jan 1, 1987

This Bureau of Mines report concerns two subjects important in the application of electric power in mining systems. Electrical transients and their suppression are discussed, and several considerations are explored with regard to the use of explosionproof or other electrical enclosures.

Jan 1, 1979

By Ronald Branstetter

Gaseous and particulate exhaust emissions from 20 diesel engines in service at five underground mines were measured with high accuracy instrumentation. The engines that were tested were checked for faults or maladjustments. The vehicle and engine maintenance organization was studied at each mine and an idealized maintenance program was devised. Faults were induced in a new diesel engine to determine their effect on the characteristics of the exhaust emissions. The results, conclusions and recommendations from this investigation are presented in this final report.

Jan 1, 1983

By John P. Borovsky

A 3-year study was conducted to evaluate the problems and benefits of using vegetation to stabilize tailing from a potential Minnesota copper-nickel milling operation. The project consisted of three separate investigations: a waste characterization study, a greenhouse study and a field study. With few exceptions, the physical and chemical characteristics of the tai ling were found to lie within the range of properties of Minnesota soils. The tailing lacks organic matter; is deficient in nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium; and may contain elevated levels of soluble salts and heavy metals, particularly copper and nickel. Numerous grasses, forbs and woody plants will tolerate the tailing as a rooting medium. Peat incorporation and topsoil dressing provided few benefits to the revegetation process which were not provided by a fertilizer application. With fertilization, grass/legume production in the tailing was comparable to local agricultural yields. Concentration of heavy metals in grasses grown in the tailing were generally below suggested tolerance limits for plants and animal forage. Legumes tended to accumulate higher concentrations of copper and nickel, and metal uptake of most plants was positively correlated with rate of fertilization. Tailing drainage water contained elevated levels of heavy metals, and establishment of vegetation had little effect on the quantity and quality of tailing drainage water. However, topsoil dressing significantly increased drainage water volume when compared to unvegetated control plots. Copper-nickel tailing revegetation recommendations were developed.

Jan 1, 1983

By J Law, S Jahanshahi, R Holmes

Iron ore is AustraliaÆs largest commodity export and is vitally important to AustraliaÆs current and future prosperity. However, while major expansions are currently in progress to satisfy demand, the industry is also undergoing major transformations. Reserves of traditional high-grade Brockman ores that have underpinned the Australian iron ore industry since its inception are slowly being depleted and alternative ore types such as Marra Mamba bedded iron deposits, Yandi and Pannawonica channel iron deposits and magnetite deposits are now being developed. However, the impurity levels in some of these alternative ores are higher and they require blending and/or upgrading as well as an advanced knowledge of their downstream processing characteristics to facilitate cost-effective utilisation by overseas customers. The research challenge is to use advanced techniques for mineral exploration, ore characterisation, mineral beneficiation, agglomeration and sustainable processing to identify and develop innovative and breakthrough options for locating, unlocking and enhancing the value of AustraliaÆs iron ore resources. Furthermore, to sustain the steel industry and hence secure the demand for iron ore, there is a growing need to enhance the environmental and business performance of the industry through reductions in wastes and emissions. Therefore, cost-effective breakthrough and enabling technologies that massively cut waste generation, CO2 emissions and water consumption are also being developed. These include the use of renewable fuels and reductants, waste heat recovery and conversion of by-product slag into a saleable substitute for Portland cement. A number of examples of recent developments in the above areas are provided in this paper.CITATION:Holmes, R, Jahanshahi, S and Law, J, 2013. Research and innovation for the iron ore to carbon steel value chain, in Proceedings Iron Ore 2013 , pp 3-6 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Aug 12, 2013

By C. G. Cheriton

The Bathurst mining district is located near the town of Bathurst on the north shore of the province of New Brunswick in eastern Canada. This region is the northeasterly extension of the Appalachian mountain system. The area is heavily forested and covered with a fairly uniform layer of glacial gravels and boulder clay. The relief is low, increasing to a few hundred feet in the north west and several hundred feet in the extreme southwest. Thus, rock outcrops are scarce and occur mostly along streams and ridges. These factors made conventional prospecting difficult and resulted in the district becoming an excellent place for the application of regional geological studies, air photo techniques, airborne and gound geophysical methods and soil sampling. Late in 1952, The Brunswick Mining and Smelting Company discovered a very large base metal sulphide body presently known as their No. 6 orebody. Early in 1953, another and even larger sulphide body was discovered and is known as the No. 12 ore body. Mining exploration was very active thoughout 1953 and in 1954, The American Metal Company discovered the orebodies which have been developed into The Heath Steele 'Mines. The location of these deposits is shown on figure one. In the latter part of 1954, The Anaconda Company became interested in the district and decided to make a geological study of this new and promising base rrietal area. The following paper presents the story of the application of modern geological and geophysical techniques, leading to the discovery of a large sul-nhidp liodv. The Bathurst district is generally underlain by the Tetagouche group of Middle Ordovician rocks.

Jan 1, 1961

By A. V. Pavlov, A. V. Dubachev, K. L. Kossyrev

The purpose of the given research was to investigate the possibility of high-carbon ferrochromium refining to remove harmful impurities as a result of metal treatment by slag mixtures on the basis of the CaO-MgO-SiO2system. The final conclusions were drawn from experimental results. It was shown that the treatment of high-carbon ferrochromium by SiO2-MgO-CaO slag mixtures with additions of chromium sinter or iron-ore concentrate removes carbon, sulphur and phosphorus from the metal. A mechanism of phosphorus removal from a melt to a gas phase is proposed.

Jan 1, 2004

By Kjell Winther

"Hydralift Scanmec introduced early in the eighties a new and different mill design for very large grinding mills. The design described has actually no size limitation upwards and is so far suggested with motor power up to 40 MW. The mill is furnished with gearless ring motor drive transmission. It is totally fabricated, without heavy castings. The first installation, an 8, 1 MW ball mill dia. 6,5 m x 9,65 m length, has been in continous operation in 13 years without problems. Total grinding costs has been reduced with 3 0% compared to traditional smaller mills. Reductions has been achieved in maintenance cost, power consumption, liner wear and grinding media consumption.So far 3 ball mills of the described design are delivered and in operation, one grinding Iron ore and two grinding Nickel ore.IntroductionThe design of mills for mineral ore dressing has basically been unchanged since grinding in mills started some I 00 years ago, in spite of the fact that mills have grown larger and larger. This has resulted in structural and mechanical problems, causing expensive failures and loss of production.Hydralift Scanmec engineers were designing mills for more than 20 years according to the old «rules». As they experienced interest for an increase in the mill size at the time when reports about failing mills were published, they started analyzing the different mill parts to find new solutions. One goal was to only use elements from proven technology in the new design. Two key items were ring motor (wrap around motor)(Isch et al. 1977, Meintrup and Klein 1982, Ranze 1983) and large diameter pad bearings (wrap around bearings)(Fuller 1984), both acknowledged from other industries."

Jan 1, 1995

By Steve Wiig

In 1987, the Rock Springs, WY district office of the US Bureau of Land Management (BLM) began to develop an automated system to store, maintain and manipulate more than 14,000 drill hole logs contained in the district's office files for various solid leasable minerals. The development of this system was based predominantly on a trial-and-error basis, with many procedural changes incorporated over time. The current Automated Drill Hole Database and Analysis System will continue to evolve with new software developments and increased personal expertise in this field. The mission of the BLM's Branch of Solid Minerals is mandated by a series of federal laws. The most important are The Mineral Leasing Act, the Federal Land Policy and Management Act, the Federal Coal Lease Amendments Act and the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act. Several regulations, promulgated from these laws, dictate that BLM must perform certain tasks and functions as part of its specific duties. The regulations that apply to the BLM Solid Minerals program are codified at 43 Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) 3400 for coal, and at 43 CFR 3500 for non-energy solid leasable minerals, such as sodium, phosphate and potash. Specific functions required of the Branch of Solid Minerals necessitates the use of geologic and drill hole data analyses. These functions can be divided into pre-lease and post-lease. Examples of pre-lease functions that normally require some level of drill hole data analyses include:

Jan 1, 1992

By William G. Pariseau

A brief description of a two-dimensional elastic-plastic finite element program intended for mine stability analysis is presented that includes detailed instruction for input data preparation and how to obtain output.

Jan 1, 1978

By W. C. Blanchard

Time Domain Reflectometry (TDR) is a remote sensing technique using active backscatter. This technique is applicable to the testing for faults and multiple partial faults on cable. The battery operated hardware developed on this con¬tract has tailored this technique for testing of mining equipment trailing electrical cables. The processing of-t-he back-scatter is accomplished using a microprocessor. The visual output from the hardware to the operator is; the type, magnitude and distance to the cable fault in a numerical format. This greatly simplifys the use of this techniques for the operator.

Jan 1, 1980

By G. B. Shea

"INTRODUCTION Much of the recent progress in increasing the efficiency of oil-well performance can be attributed to advancements in the art of cleaning wells. Through research and development by operators and service companies during the past decade, significant improvements in the application of engineering and chemical principles to well-cleaning technology have widened greatly the scope of ""clean-out"" methods to the end that greater ultimate recovery of oil will be attained.This report reviews recent improvements and developments on this important problem in California; it describes also the use of various methods and tools for cleaning wells to stimulate or revive their productivity. Developments in preventing and removing mud sheaths in well-completion operations also are described. The report is based on a field survey, supplemented by data from the technical and patent literature and from manufacturers' catalogs, which contain much valuable information.In preparing the material for publication as a Bureau of Mines report, the author has been fully aware of certain limiting conditions that attend the discussion of a subject such as that treated in this report. The following are examples:1. To a considerable extent, well cleaning in California is done with tools rented from service companies, and their representatives and employees are specialists in jobs of this type. They usually have working experience with their own equipment and methods which greatly exceeds that of persons whose interest has been casual or who have had no opportunity to study the subject in detail in actual practice. Many of the tools and methods are covered by letters patent for the protection that may be in developing and successfully applying these mechanical and chemical means of increasing the production of wells. Frequently several years have been required to perfect a given tool or technique, requiring relatively large investments to establish a service that is remunerative to those who have primary interest in a certain development and at the same time attractive enough to the operators of producing properties (because of greater quantities of oil delivered into the flow tanks) to warrant employment of or contractual agreements with a particular service group."

May 1, 1943

By Donna L. Anderson

This U.S. Bureau of Mines report describes a system to determine the position and heading of a continuous mining machine during the maneuvers required at the face area of a mine. The system consists of commercially available angular position sensors and a computer interface developed and tested at the Bureau. The sensors employed are laser-based scanning devices that report the angular location of retroreflective targets within their 90° field-of-view. The targets are mounted on the continuous mining machine; the laser scanners are mounted on an external reference structure. The computer interface consists of a single-board computer-controller programmed to gather and process the angular position information, and to calculate the machine's position and heading relative to the reference structure. A sensor fusion algorithm will be incorporated into the computer interface programming to increase the accuracy and reliability of the system.

Jan 1, 1989

By V. D. Jalevsky

A new methodology of an experimental-analytical approach has been developed. It is used in building an information geomechanic monitoring system for the modeling of geomechanic processes during coal seam working. The approach synthesizes experimental (in-situ) measurements of rock pressure manifestation in separate points, methods of numerical modeling of processes on rock boundaries with coal, and a seam analytical calculation of rock mass in a spatial strained state. One of the realizations of this approach is the developed theory and calculation method of adjoining rock surface shift (overhang) formation during underground working of sheet deposits and of rock mass geomechanic state determination. There are description algorithms of cavity configurations with broken lengths of faces during underground working of useful mineral sheet deposits. These algorithms have been used in computer modeling of formations of adjoining rock surface overhangs and abutment pressure upon rock mass in the area of coal faces with irrectilinear longwalls. Peculiarities of surfaces shifts and stress allocation are established for different face schemes. The use of theory and methods alloww working out techniques of automatic control to receive processing algorithms of RPM measurement results and calculate geomechanic situations within panels in the process of planning and development as well as during mining, i.e., to carry out long-term prediction, in-line control, and short-term prediction of rock pressure manifestations.

Jan 1, 1996

By George A. Savanick

Coal mine roof shales fracture preferentially at slickensided surfaces because of weak or nonexistent adhesion between two slickensided rock surfaces. The purpose of this Bureau of Mines research was to characterize chemically the thin film of smooth, glossy material that makes up the slickenside. This material was analyzed by electron spectroscopy and ion scattering spectrometry while in place on the rock surface and by standard methods of quantitative chemical analysis on concentrate removed from the rock. These analyses showed that the chemistry and mineralogy of the slickensides are similar to that of the adjacent shale.

Jan 1, 1974

By J. G. Donaldson

Nickel containing less than 0.01 percent of total metallic impurities was produced at the Rolla Metallurgy Research Center of the Bureau of Mines by electrodeposition from purified electrolytes. The first report on this research4 described purification of electrolytes by selective precipitation and by liquid-liquid extraction. This second report describes a procedure: or electrodepositing high-purity nickel from electrolytes purified by passing a nickel ammine solution through a column of an ion exchange resin. The nickel electroplated directly from the ammine solution without further treatment; a titanium cathode and two platinum anodes were used. The nickel deposit was dense, smooth, and adherent, and contained less than 0.001 percent each of cobalt, copper, and iron, and spectrographically detectable traces of aluminum, magnesium, and silicon. Nonmetallic impurities in the nickel metal were carbon and sulfur, each present in concentrations of less than 0.01 percent. The results of several experiments planned to purify solid nickel salts by zone refining are also reported. These salts, after purification, were intended for use in preparing electrolytes for deposition of high-purity nickel. Results were not encouraging so that the more promising ion exchange procedure was emphasized chiefly.

Jan 1, 1962