Search Documents

By N Pirouznia, F Rashidi Nejad, S Naraghi

Sungun Copper Mine, which is the second largest copper mining operation in Iran has a large tailings storage facility with a seepage control dam located downstream of the main dam. Surface and groundwater in surrounding area of the tailings storage facility has been monitored for ten years. This paper will discuss the results of the surface and groundwater monitoring and seepage control at the Sungun Copper Mine. The results of the study show that if the tailings storage facility influence the water quality of the rivers, this effect is not significant, so that the prevailing parameters of the measured parameters were within the permissible standard of drinking water in Iran.CITATION:Rashidi Nejad, F, Naraghi, S and Pirouznia, N, 2018. Surface and groundwater monitoring and seepage control at the Sungun Copper Mine, in Proceedings Mine Waste and Tailings Stewardship Conference 2018, pp 439–453 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Jul 23, 2018

By B Prasad, M P. Roy, P K. Singh, C Drebenstedt

Blasting operations play a pivotal role in the overall economics of opencast mines. The blasting subsystem affects all the other associated subsystems, ie loading, transport, crushing and milling operations. Fragmentation control through effective blast design and its effect on productivity is a challenging job for the practicing blasting engineer due to inadequate knowledge of actual explosive energy released in the borehole, effect of varying initiation practice in blast design and its effect on explosive energy release characteristic. This paper describes the result of a systematic study on the impact of blast design parameters on rock fragmentation at two mines in India. Both the mines use draglines and shovel-dumper combination for removal of overburden. Despite its pivotal role in controlling the overall economics of a mining operation, the expected blasting performance is often judged almost exclusively on the basis of poorly defined parameters such as powder factor and is often qualitative, which results in a very subjective assessment of blasting performance. Such an approach is a very poor substitute for accurate assessment of explosive and blasting performance. Forty-seven blasts were conducted with varying blast designs and charging patterns and their impact on the rock fragmentation are documented. A high-speed camera was deployed to record the detonation sequences of the blasts. The efficiency of the loading machines was also correlated with the mean fragment size obtained from the fragmentation analyses.CITATION:Singh, P K, Roy, M P, Drebenstedt, C and Prasad, B, 2015. Blast design parameters and their impact on rock fragmentation, in Proceedings 11th International Symposium on Rock Fragmentation by Blasting, pp 755–762 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Aug 24, 2015

By A Bennett, S Arndt

Minerals and Metals Group Pty Ltd (Golden Grove Mine) commissioned a comprehensive study of the life of mine using advanced 3D stress modelling. Essential input into the modelling was the proposed mining sequence, itself the culmination of years of planning and geotechnical experience gained in comparing actual performance to predictions. The modelling approach addressed the whole of mine at a scale of 5 km. There were however several magnitudes of scale to address, from the scale of laboratory testing (0.05 m), to drive size (5 m), extraction size (50 m) and stope size (500 m). Scaling was therefore an integral part of the procedure. The constitutive rock properties in terms of peak and post-peak behaviour varied with the scale. At the laboratory scale, the constitutive relationships for all the main rock units were determined in 3D as well as recovering the in situ stress using the rock memory technique, deformation rate analysis (DRA), whereas at the larger scale the properties were varied to match observations.The modelling, using non-linear analysis to account for rock mass yield and peak-residual strength, demonstrated that if the planned extraction sequence and stope geometry had been pursued there was a high probability of large volumes of excess shear stress being released. However, it was not possible to identify whether the excess shear stress (ESS) will release as one large event or many smaller events. The mining approach was to modify the extraction sequence/stope geometry to manage the hazard. This is where the economic advantage can be realised.Alternatively or in combination with further modelling, the volume identified with the predicted high ESS or energy release could be intensively explored for structures having adverse orientation to the stress change and with sufficient areal extent to release the ESS. The microseismic data can be interrogated for the likelihood of a large event to support the hypothesis of a singular release versus multiple releases of smaller events. If the initial planned extraction sequence had to proceed as designed, changes to dimensioned stopes would be recommended for risk mitigation. Mine planning could as an option, modify the sequence and the extraction could then be remodelled.CITATION:Bennett, A, Arndt, S and Dight, P M, 2014. The economic advantages of detailed geotechnical assessments for extraction sequencing, in Proceedings 12th AusIMM Underground Operators’ Conference 2014 , pp 243–250 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Mar 24, 2014

By A M. Barrett, P J. Chapman

As filtering technology improves and there is an increased focus on environmental impacts, the concept of managing fine coal rejects by filtering, mixing with coarse rejects and dry stacking them is being considered more seriously. In Queensland, there appears to be a desire from regulators to move away from wet rejects facilities towards dry-stacked facilities, resulting in a change in the risk profile for the facility.A coalminer has a site with many constraints, including limited area that is not planned to be undermined and nearby rivers that are prone to flooding. The design of a dry-stacked facility that meets the operational requirements and environmental compliance criteria is challenging in subtropical climatic settings, where there is a need to consider wet seasons with high-volume, sustained rainfall events. The impact of the rainfall is multifaceted, requiring careful surface water management to separate clean and contact water, adequate foundation preparation to limit seepage to groundwater, management of stack stability given a potentially high phreatic surface and the avoidance of potential flood zones. These design constraints were compounded by a limited area available for rejects storage that would not be undermined.This paper presents a summary of the conceptual design of a dry rejects facility, including consideration of regulatory and client requirements, provision for expansion while also considering progressive rehabilitation, diversion of clean water as much as practicable during operations and siting constraints. A step-by-step concept is presented that addresses each constraint during the life of the facility.CITATION:Barrett, A M and Chapman, P J, 2015. Conceptual design of a dry-stacked coal rejects facility in a subtropical climate, in Proceedings Tailings and Mine Waste Management for the 21st Century , pp 27–34 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Jul 27, 2015

By K M. P Singh, K M. K Sinha, G S. Jha, T Gouricharan, K K. Sharma

The majority of the powerplants in India are fed with non-coking coals, with the coals dispatched from their respective mines via wagons loaded by a rapid loading system or pay loader. The usual top size of coal is 200 mm and sampling is carried out manually from wagons. The manual method of wagon top sampling of large size raw coal is not only difficult, but also violates some of the fundamental principles of sampling. As per sampling requirements, samples are to be drawn from the full depth of the wagons, which is impossible to be done manually. Since the ash distribution in the different size fractions is not homogeneous, the results from the samples, which do not reflect the true size distribution of the lot, are likely to be biased. More importantly, sample collection by shovel from the top is a function of human discretion and not governed by the equiprobability rule. In another case, the sample has been collected by a cross belt-type auto mechanical sampler for 200 mm size coal at one of the super thermal power stations. Test analysis shows that coal collected using a cross belt-type mechanical sampler also has significant deviations from stopped belt coal samples of 200 mm size due to size segregation. Studies carried out on wagon top sampling through specially designed experiments reveal some interesting features. The presence of bias in wagon top sampling is apparent when compared with the ‘stopped belt’ sample. In this paper, a comparative study between manual wagon top sampling/auto mechanical sampling with respect to stopped belt sampling has been conducted for coal of size 200 mm. In addition, precision studies have been performed for wagon top sampling/mechanical sampling for Indian thermal powerplants.CITATION:Sinha, K M K, Sharma, K K, Jha, G S, Singh, K M P and Gouricharan, T, 2014. A comparative study of manual wagon top sampling and auto mechanical sampling of 200 mm size coal with respect to stopped belt sampling of thermal coal at Indian super thermal powerplants, in Proceedings Sampling 2014 , pp 43–48 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Jul 29, 2014

By E Widzyk-Capehart

The mines of the future can be envisioned as complex, large-scale technological systems being operated remotely from few centrally located (major cities) operating centres and skeletal crew stationed at the site. These systems will require remotely located human operators to constantly adapt to new and unforeseen system and environmental demands. In addition, the remote operators will need to match system properties to the changing demands and operational conditions, ie must be able to handle the ‘non-design’ emergencies, because the system designers would not have been able to foresee all possible scenarios of failures and provide automatic safety devices for every contingency. Therefore, it is highly important that the operators’ job, which involves problem solving and decision making at the workstation level, is facilitated by the proper interface designs. This paper argues that decision support systems and thus human-system interfaces for the mines of the future should be developed based on the principles of human-system integration that take into account human information processing and cognitive abilities. The information presented to the operator must support the operator in taking appropriate action through a human-system interface designed according to scientific principles of User Centred Design. A case study is presented where an iterative design process was used by CSIRO researchers as an evaluation method involving users (control room operators) at several stages of the user interface design in order to correct any design inadequacies as they emerged. This process allowed the designers to identify any usability issues before the user interface was fully implemented, which subsequently enabled the control room operators to easily adapt to the new interface and carry out all designated tasks in a timely and effective manner.

Nov 22, 2011

By O Joneydi, J Viljoen, R Funnell

Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) modelling is a useful tool that can assist engineers in designing effective ventilation systems for the control of airborne dust generated during mining operations. Thistechnology can save time, effort and the costs associated with re-work or the traditional on-site experimental field trials by running desktop 3D simulations of the various proposed scenarios using state-of-the-art CFD analysis tools. Before implementing a dust management system, an understanding of the behaviour of airborne dust particles in the face zone can be achieved, which can improve the confidence in the secondary ventilation and dust management design. Usingadvanced numerical models, suitable dust extraction strategies can be foreseen, and multiple scenarios can be simulated and investigated quickly. As a case study, dry drilling operations in Kimberlite orebodies produce large quantities of fine dust which poses health and safety risks. An effective dust management system is required to achieve acceptable face conditions. A possible practical solution is a ducted exhaust ventilation system with a force fan in the face zone. This paper demonstrates how CFD analysis can be used as a tool to assist the design engineer with validating and optimising the proposed ventilation design by tracking the trajectories of different size dust particles, to determine the best equipment layout and appropriate flow rates which minimises airborne dust.

Oct 12, 2022

By S J. Kim, S W. Kim, L Tomas da Rocha, S Jung

Al2O3 has been regarded as a harmful gangue component in iron ore, especially causing reduction degradation in industrial sintering of iron ore. The current study aimed to utilise low-grade iron ore containing high Al2O3 content in sintering process. In order to counteract the adverse effect of Al2O3 on reduction behaviour of iron ore sinter, mill-scale and calcined dolomite were chosen as FeO- and MgO-bearing materials. Firstly, mill-scale was added to high Al2O3 sinter and addition was optimised as 10 wt per cent, then calcined dolomite was added further. Magnetite and magnesio-ferrite were identified as the major phases in iron ore sinter when adding mill-scale and calcined dolomite. As the dosage of calcined dolomite increased beyond 4 wt per cent of in sinter mix, unreacted MgO particles were observed, which is ascribed to the limitation of MgO dissolution into magnetite matrix. Both mill-scale and calcined dolomite were effective in improving compressive load and Reduction Disintegration Index (RDI) of iron ore sinter although its reduction degree was highly decreased. The addition of both FeO and MgO-bearing materials to high Al2O3 sinter has a potential to improve the sinter quality, also contribute to the recycling of industrial by-product. However, the amount should be optimised in views of phase development and deterioration of reducibility.

Jun 19, 2024

In the general planning of this area, provision was made for the distribution over the whole area as required of the following services:(a) Power and lighting from the substation distribution boards 'located in the winder house.(b) Miscellaneous electrical indicating, control and signalling systems.(c) Telephone lines from the main internal automatic exchange located in the changehouse, the town exchange to the automatic exchange and also direct lines from the town exchange to selected offices.(d) Compressed air from the incoming 16-in. air main. (e) Water, both unfiltered and filtered; and the disposal of the following effluents:(f) Sewage from the area to the town sewage system.(g) Changehouse shower water to the regeneration area.(h) Storm water to the general mine surface drainage system leading out to the naturally drained area north of the No. 8 Shaft.

Jan 1, 1957

By G Tsatouhas, R Newell, K Y. Wong

A sulfide ion selective electrode was used to control sulfidiser addition in the flotation testing of a synthetic and a naturally occurring ore containing malachite in order to compare the behaviour of sodium sulfide and calcium polysulfide. Both slug and controlled potential sulfidisation methods of addition were used. Under defined optimum CPS conditions, calcium polysulfide was a more effective sulfidising agent than sodium sulfide on the basis of both capital and operating costs. Surface and solution studies were used to compare the mechanism of each sulfidiser. For calcium polysulfide, XPS showed that polysulfide ions are adsorbed, whereas for sodium sulfide it is the hydrosulfide ions that are adsorbed on the mineral surface. For calcium polysulfide, the CuSx layer was believed to form on the malachite surface, which promoted the flotation of the malachite, by xanthate. Studies of surface morphology of the sulfidised malachite showed that a fairly uniform sulfidised layer is formed with both reagents. The use of sodium sulfide resulted in a thinner initial sulfidised layer compared to polysulfide at equivalent initial sulfur concentration.

Jan 1, 2005

By M Allen

By its nature, the mining industry is energy and emissions intensive. In the future, the world will still require the outputs of mining but the industry will need to adapt to the low emissions economy. Understanding the risks of climate change to a particular site or at a company level is key to managing this transition.CITATION:Allen, M, 2018. Assessment of climate risk in the Australian mining industry, in Proceedings Life-of-Mine 2018, pp 13–16 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Jul 25, 2018

The Rio Tinto Iron Ore group currently estimates grade attributes for mineral resources using ordinary kriging (OK). OK produces a smoothed globally unbiased estimate, but does not capture local variability, which can have significant impact on mine planning and scheduling. The dimensions and the multivariate nature of iron ore deposits make point simulations of whole deposits impractical. With a direct block simulation method the size and speed limitations of point simulations can potentially be overcome, resulting in a viable method for capturing local variability and for providing risk measures into the mine plan and schedules. Some iron ore deposits are highly folded (post mineralisation) and require preprocessing using an unfolding algorithm to properly define the continuity parameters and directions of anisotropy before simulation can proceed. Block co-simulation proceeds in unfolded space and since mine planning require a block-model with regular block-sizes; a regular block-model is unfolded first. This paper discusses a block co-simulation approach that can be used to simulate the irregular blocks resulting from the unfolding process. A section of an iron ore deposit is used for testing the block co-simulation algorithm and the simulation results are compared against the Isatis direct block simulation method. Available blasthole data is also used to validate the behaviour of the block co-simulation algorithm.

Sep 26, 2011

By T D. H McGrath, J P. Vaughan, J Heath, J J. Eksteen

A reliable laboratory method to characterise the response of free gold particles when subjected to flash flotation conditions has been developed by AMIRA P420 researchers at Curtin University. This test has been applied to assess the flotation recovery of gravity recoverable gold from free milling ores as well as synthetic ores featuring either a gravity concentrate or gold powder. Trends in free gold flotation kinetics as well as size and milling effects were identified for gold recovery, based on the different gold types, reagent dosage and residence time.CITATION:McGrath, T D H, Eksteen, J J, Vaughan, J P and Heath, J, 2013. Laboratory flash flotation trends for a variety of gold particles, in Proceedings World Gold 2013 , pp 357-366 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Sep 26, 2013

The last decade has seen a dramatic change in the. size and complexity of mining and mineral processing projects in Austral- asia. Major projects of today are vastly different from major projects of the 19.50's. This change has in turn resulted in a change in the role-of consultants whose contributions have been increasingly in the provision of specialist services and less in the form of overall project design and construction supervision. It is anticipated that, the specialist function will continue to represent the principle mode for consultant participation in major, projects. However, by means' of international affiliation, the development of comprehensive engineering and project management capabilities and possibly as a result of Government intervention, it is expected ,that local consultants will assume an increasing degree of participation in.the overall project design and supervision Function.

Jan 1, 1975

In-situ leaching of gold deposits has not become an option largely as a result the lack of suitability of cyanide as a lixiviant due to sluggish kinetics and high dependence on the availability of oxygen. A second problem area is the excessive cost of drilling the required number of injection and production wells needed to service a wellfield capable of maintaining any significant throughput or providing and acceptable level of gold production. Well spacing in in-situ leaching operations is limited by solution life, dissolution rate, and the need for solution control. With cyanide the life of an active solution capable of dissolving significant gold is severely limited by the availability of oxygen which cannot be readily replaced while the solution remains underground. The extremely slow gold dissolution rate also necessitates excessive contact periods in order to dissolve coarse gold.

Jan 1, 1991

The occurrence of metallic minerals in Australia to the time of the proclamation of South Australia as a Colony in 1836 was unknown. It is, therefore, perhaps, surprising that British settlers arriving in the Coromandel included among their number a German scientist Johannes Menge who had been appointed by the South Australian Company to the post of Mine and Quarry Agent and Geologist on 1 July 1836. His instructions were to `explore the natural productions of the Colony above and below ground and to superintend the working of quarries of stone and slate, the boring for water, metal, lead, coal and other mines at a salary of ú150 per annum for one year and for as much longer as the Company require your services not however exceeding five years'. In the event, he was to have little influence on those matter.

Jan 1, 1993

By A G. Shellsh, R J. Henham, J R. Foley

The Porgera Gold Mine, west of Mt Hagen in PNG is a large open pit and underground operation currently producing gold at the rate of almost one million ounces per year. This deposit has produced some 8.8 million ounces to-date and has current reserves of 103.4 million tonnes @3.2 g/t Au. The Porgera Joint Venture has invested over $A1 billion in infrastructure in this project. Technical management of this operation involves the interrogation of some 700 000 metres of diamond drilling, some 50 000 blastholes per year, and very large volumes of laboratory, geotechnical, environmental and production reporting data. Over the past seven years this data has been consolidated into a single centralised, relational database which now acts as the single reference point for all the technical application systems used for surveying, grade control, production reporting, deposit evaluation and modelling. Data transfer to application programs and management systems is controlled by the centralised database, this process at times involving a two-way, real-time, binary data transfer. The benefits of a specialised database application include security and integrity of the data asset, ease of access, and performance in a multi-user environment. This replaced fragmented, inconsistent data sets stored inefficiently as individual, unindexed, variably formatted files associated with the different application programs. Most importantly, the database has allowed mine management at all levels to make timely, confident investment, cash flow and optimisation decisions as it provides the primary link between the deposit and operational data sets on one hand, and the application programs and management and performance measurement systems on the other. This paper discusses the economic value and importance of technical data in terms of the resource asset and the means by which this data is being managed and used at Porgera.

Jan 1, 2000

By Sarkar B. C, Sen A. K

India is well endowed with vast reserves of banded hematite ore, about 12 billion tonnes, estimated by some conventional methods. Various authors have assessed this huge reserve using some advanced geostatistical methods. A Banded Iron Formation (BIF) belt named the `Singhbhum-Keonjhar-Bonai' belt in India has been chosen as a case study. In this paper, the experiences of Chiria iron ore, in particular, have been described. This study will finally create a dynamic mineral inventory after standardising the geostatistical parameters which will help to cater for the needs of the stringent quality requirements of the Indian steel industries.

Jan 1, 1995

By A Simmons, R Longey, D Brett

The South Deposit Tailings Storage Facility (SDTSF), located at Grange Resources Pty Ltd’s (Grange) Savage River mine in north west Tasmania, has recently begun construction. The facility will provide storage for approximately 37 million cubic metres of tailings, equating to approximately 20 years’ tailings storage.The SDTSF embankment will be constructed entirely out of waste rock won from mining operations, and will feature a flow-through drain constructed from alkaline, non-acid forming (NAF) waste rock. This provides Grange with an economical storage solution for waste management (both tailings and waste rock) and maximises available space on site. The outflows discharged through the alkaline rock ‘flow-through’ will provide a long-term source of alkalinity to Main Creek, subsequently feeding into Savage River. This will provide environmental benefits to the downstream ecology that has long been degraded due to the effects of legacy acid and metalliferous drainage (AMD), caused by historical mining operations.CITATION:Longey, R, Brett, D and Simmons, A, 2015. Integrated mine waste management – South Deposit Tailings Storage Facility, Savage River mine, Tasmania, in Proceedings Tailings and Mine Waste Management for the 21st Century , pp 343–352 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Jul 27, 2015

By V Ser, R Crosbie

To date, Anglo American Research Laboratories (AARL) has carried out several projects, based on the techniques developed in AMIRA International LimitedÆs (the mineral industries research association) AMIRA P9 project, to develop models for several Anglo Base Metals flotation plants. Further detailed analysis of the data which was generated has realised additional benefits: the various hydrodynamic measurements were useful in comparing cell operating parameters to literature sources, while the laboratory batch tests give an indication of plant recovery potential. A detailed cell by cell mass balance, which is a critical feature of the modelling process, is in its own right a valuable diagnostic tool. Several examples of how this can be used to highlight potential improvement areas in the plants are presented. The added understanding gained from sampling each cell is clear and this is shown to more than compensate for any necessary modifications needed to allow sampling to take place. The model fitting process generates an ore floatability distribution, which is used in the JK SimFloat simulation package to assess the effect of possible changes to each of the circuits. An example of an actual circuit change as a result of this approach is presented. The current limitations of and the potential improvements to the modelling process are also briefly discussed. Future models will be extended to include enhanced size and mineralogical information where the basic models suggest this has potential to improve understanding.

Jan 1, 2005