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By L. J. Cunningham

Introduction The property of Rouyn Merger Gold Mines, Limited, is in Rouyn and Joannès townships, Western Quebec, seven miles east of the town of Rouyn. Traversing it is the east-west trending Cadillac-Bouzan fault. Diamond drilling in 1944 and 1945 along a shear zone south of the fault indicated an ore deposit lying at the contact between sedimentary and volcanic rocks and dipping approximately 60° to the northwest. In the summer of 1945 it was decided to sink a shaft to investigate the indicated ore zone. In the immediate vicinity of the deposit, bed-rock is overlain by clay beds, in some places as much as 70 feet thick. Consequently, possible shaft sites were limited to those locations where overburden would not be excessive. The most favourable site was about 125 feet to the south of the ore zone as projected vertically from bed-rock to the surface. Accordingly, it was decided to sink the shaft at this point, with an inclination of 60° N. W., paralleling the dip of the ore zone.

Jan 1, 1948

By A. R. Miller, G. Desrivières, M. C. Bétournay, D. L. Barnes, P. Laliberté

"Over the last four years, an international initiative, championed by Vehicle Projects LLC, the Fuelcell Propulsion Institute and Natural Resources Canada, has been active in carrying out research projects to prove out the concept of applying fuel cell technology to underground mining vehicles. These have been carried out by a consortium consisting of mining companies, equipment manufacturers, technology developers, national laboratories and consultants, with the participation of Canadian and U.S. mine regulatory agencies.This clean technology, which produces only water and electricity, would allow several advantages to be obtained, in the health area (by eliminating diesel emissions and reducing noise generation), in lowering production costs (such as reducing ventilation required) and lowering greenhouse gas emissions.This paper outlines the results obtained in several key areas, such as, the operation of fuel cells in underground conditions, risk issues related to underground and surface operation of hydrogen vehicles and hydrogen production and delivery systems, and the design and mining performance of the world’s first hydrogen mining vehicle, a mine production locomotive. The work to date on the fuel cell loader, designing the power plant and power transmission systems, operational requirements, and operating cost reductions is also presented."

Jan 1, 2003

By Louis Cabot

A pilot plant of the Modular Gold Processing Unit (MGPU) was designed, installed and operated, over a 8 months period, by RSW-Béroma, at the Granada Mine located near Rouyn-Noranda, Quebec. A description of the project geology, plant set up as well as exploitation results, including productivity and profitability curves, are given for a small scale mining operation in comparison with larger ones. Copyright ã 2001 CIM

May 1, 2001

By A. Ignatieff

This is the second review of developments in coal mining engineering (see C.I.M .M. Transactions, Vol. LI, 1948, pp. 262- 264) and covers the period from October, 1948, to January, 1950. Mechanization The period under review was characterized by the intensive development of appliances providing for complete mechanization of coal-face operations. A variety of machines are being evolved or have already been placed on the market which embody the principle of 'continuous mining'. This trend can be observed in all coal producing countries. In the United States, two continuous mining machines have been developed for entry and room application and by the end of 1 949 were being used in a number of mines. These are the Joy Continuous Miner in which the coal is ripped from the face by means of multiple cutter chains, and the Jeffrey Colmol employing cutters on rotating arms for chipping the coal from the face. The Joy machine is made in tw6l models, 34-in. and 48-in. high and designed for a range of seam thicknesses from 3-ft. -t-in. to 4-ft. 6-in. and from 4-ft. 6-in. to 8ft., respectively. Some experience has been gained with this machine and accounts of its performance are already appearing in the technical literature. The Jeffrey-Colmol has a more limited range of working height. The first model, 38-in. high, was designed for seams about 4 feet in thick11ess but more recently the 28-in. low model has been placed on the market for seams 2-ft. 6-in, to 3-ft. 4-in. in thickness. Conventional mobile loading machines of the gathering-arm type are continuing to yield high production under suitable conditions, and improvements or modifications of the basic principle are embodied in new machines as, for example, the Jeffrey mobile (conveyor) loader with extensible (gathering-arm) head developed for conveyor mining.

Jan 1, 1950

By Real Daigneault, François Robert, J. Paul Golightly, Jean-Yves Cloutier, Jayanta Guha, Pierre Pilote

"The Casa-Berardi East, Center and West deposits, located in the Archean Abitibi, Sub province, are hosted by volcanic and sedimentary units of varying compositions, less than300 m from the Casa-Berardi fault (CBF). The CBF, a brittle structure, represents an increment in the structural evolution of a regional-scale deformation zone showing ductile-brittle behavior known as the Casa-Berardi deformation zone (CBDZ). The CBDZ is characterized by a mylonitic Sc1 foliation which is folded a.n4 deformed by a later sczfoliation in high strain zones.Four generations of quartz vein and fracture systems have been recognized within the Casa-Berardi deposits. Most economic gold mineralization, occurring in the second generation system, is found within high strain zones. This system hosts three types of mineralized structures: (1) banded quartz veins; (2) swarms of veins and mineralized host rocks; and (3) disseminated sulphides along fractures. An early carbonate hydrothermal alteration zone (pre- to syntectonic) surrounds the deposits. Alteration associated with gold mineralization is contemporaneous to late ( syn- to post-tectonic) relative to the development of progressive deformation in the CBDZ. The geological characteristics and paragenesis of the four quartz vein and fracture systems developed as an integral part of the geodynamic evolution of the Casa-Berardi deformation zone."

Jan 1, 1990

Ground support audits are sometimes necessary in ageing underground mines. Usually, the purpose of such audits is to assess the state of the ground support in various parts of the mine, identify areas that require attention and establish rehabilitation requirements. In 2005, Brunswick Mine, located in Bathurst, New Brunswick, Canada, completed a comprehensive mine-wide ground support audit. The areas examined included excavations in several mining blocks, as well as ramps, shaft stations, garages, shops, etc., throughout the mine. A vast amount of data was collected over a period of two weeks by multiple auditing teams. The audit was followed by a data digitisation exercise, and the creation of a data management system to store audit results and keep track of subsequent rehabilitation activities as they occur. One aspect of the data management system was the incorporation of a function for reporting on ground rehabilitation progress, along with the capability of updating mine level plans for easy visual presentation of this progress. This article describes the approach implemented at the mine to carry-out the audit, as well as the database constructed to manage the results.

May 1, 2009

By H. A. Steane

"This presentation will cover some crushing and grinding considerations in plant design and operation. There is nothing basically new in the subject matter presented here; however, the viewpoint and interpretation may be novel and some of it controversial.The presentation is based on experience gained in the metallurgical design of plants for Placer Development Limited from 1960 to the present. The plants are listed on SLIDE No. 1.These plants have conventional crushing, followed by rod mill and ball mill grinding. I would like to think that autogenous grinding plants are the answer for eliminating secondary crushing plants and reducing the capital and operating costs; however, the autogenous plants seem to have some problems of their own and I have had no experience with them.Fineness of Grinding RequiredFirst let us consider the fineness of grinding required.The fineness of grind will affect the recovery obtained, and the relationship must be determined. If the grinding is too coarse, some of the valuable mineral, either free or locked in middling grains, will not be floated. However, as grinding is probably the greatest single operating cost, we do not want to grind any finer than is justified economically.Finer grinding should not be carried beyond the point where the net smelter return for the increment saved becomes less than the added operating cost. Even this fineness will be beyond the economic limit because of the additional capital cost for the equipment needed to achieve it. These factors will be discussed in more detail later.The Bond work index is the commonest method of expressing a measure of the effort that has to be expended in grinding. It is the kilowatt-hours required to reduce a ton of rock from an infinite size to 80% passing 100 microns. The formula allows a calculation to be made for other size ranges."

Jan 1, 1976

By Ann Lamontagne

Le parc à résidus de l?ancienne mine Dunraine contient des résidus générateurs de drainage minier acide. Le concept proposé pour la restauration du site est d?utiliser le fort potentiel alcalin des boues rouges, résidus d?aluminerie, afin de neutraliser les résidus miniers. En appliquant une certaine quantité de boues rouges à la surface du parc, on provoquera une neutralisation de l?acidité. De plus, les alcalis contenus dans les boues rouges vont provoquer la précipitation de minéraux stables (sulfates tel la jarosite). La précipitation de ces minéraux provoquera la formation d?une couche indurée qui rendra difficile la circulation de l?oxygène et de l?eau. Bien que ce concept ait été vérifié en laboratoire, ce sont là des hypothèses qui restent à vérifier dans des conditions réelles d?exposition. Les principales questions soulevées par l?utilisation des boues rouges, mis à part le contexte géochimique, est le contexte technico-économique. En effet, le transport de quantité importante d?un matériel argileux humide présente un défi économique important. Outre le défi économique, la manipulation et l?épandage de ce produit sur des parcs à résidus constituent également un défi important. Cet article présente les conclusions d?une étude technique sur le transport, la manutention et l?épandage de boues rouges sur un parc à résidus situés en Abitibi : le site de Dunraine.

Nov 1, 2002

By V. Chatain

The environmental assessment of historical mining sites contaminated with various inorganic species, as also the determination of remediation targets require a better knowledge of pollutant-bearing phases. The objective of this paper was to investigate the operational fractionation of arsenic (As) in an As contaminated (ca. 3 wt%) soil collected from a gold mining site in France, where mining activities and smelting processes of gold ores took place until 2004. Single and sequential chemical extraction procedures were performed to evaluate the potential mobility of As according to the fractions to which it was associated in the contaminated soil, and also the part of As sorbed onto soil particles. These procedures used provided information on the nature of As fixation processes in the mining soil studied. Results showed that As appeared mainly sorbed (ca. 72%) with iron on the soil particles, in particular amorphous iron oxyhydroxides. These results confirmed a potential risk of arsenic mobilization under acidic and/or reducing conditions, which frequently occur in mining environment. This research evidenced the importance of the knowledge of As-bearing phases to better predict the mobility of this pollutant and in turn improve the management of As contaminated sites.

Aug 1, 2013

By F. Baczek, S. S. Rocks, D. Chaiko, C. Eyzaguirre, S. Asihene, T. Walters

The majority of efforts to improve primary copper sulfide leaching have focused on solution chemistry, temperature, O2 pressure, ultra-fine grinding, the use of catalysts, etc. Historically, very few studies have focused on the solid/solution interface. A new, patent pending approach to catalyzed, copper sulfide leaching has been discovered by FLSmidth that enables manipulation of the 2-D semi-conductor properties of chalcopyrite surfaces to the benefit of higher electrochemical reactivity. Copper dissolution rates are then further accelerated by incorporating a Stirred Media Reactor (SMRt) into the process. By using minute amounts of Cu2+ to "pre-activate" chalcopyrite, leach times have been reduced from >20 hours with incomplete Cu dissolution to <2 hours with 98+% Cu dissolution at 80°C. The pre-activation process takes only minutes to complete at temperatures of 80°C or less. The total atmospheric leaching process, incorporating the pre-activation and Stirred Media Reactor is compatible with existing SX/EW processes. Results of batch leach testing are presented and possible mechanisms are discussed.

Jan 1, 2015

By Peter A. Cain, John C. Folinsbee

"A 4-ft.-diameter shaft has been drilled to a depth of 2,790 ft. in strong, hard, basic Precambrian rocks at Lynn Lake Manitoba. This was done on the property of Sherritt Gordon Mines Limited for the purpose of ventilating and developing the ""N"" orebody, which is located approximately 4,000 ft. south of the Farley shaft.The drilling was done under contract by two drilling companies. Peter Bawden Drilling (1964) Limited drilled the initial 12:1,4-in. pilot hole to a depth of 3,000 ft. Shaft Drillers Limited of Canada then reamed the hole to 4 ft. in diameter to a depth of 2,790 ft. At this point, the reaming was stopped because of the difficulty in passing a change in direction in the line of the pilot hole. The hole was completed by driving a raise 200 ft. from the 3000 level to the bottom of the 4-ft. hole using an Alimak raise climber.Cuttings from the reaming operation were directed into the 12:1,4-in. pilot hole, where they fell to the 3000 level and were removed by a mucking machine and standard mine development cars.The elapsed time from the start of the pilot hole to the completion of the reaming operation was ten months, with an average advance of 279ft. per month. There was a two-month delay between the completion of the pilot hole and the start of the reaming operation.The 12:1,4-in. hole was drilled in an elapsed time of 45 days from the time of setting up the rig. The average advance per day was 66.8 ft.The reaming operation was done in an elapsed time of 194 days. A one-month delay required to repair damaged equipment left 163 days for the drilling and setting-up operation, for an advance per day of 17.1 ft."

Jan 1, 1966

By A. Azad

SAGD (Steam Assisted Gravity Drainage) is an in-situ oil recovery technique for heavy oil reservoirs. The technique has been successfully applied to many projects in the past 25 years and the process has been, now, well understood. It is now believed that geomechanics plays an important role in SAGD and should be considered in numerical or analytical modeling. Currently, geomechanics is numerically modeled through combining a multi-phase flow and a geomechanical simulator. Numerical modeling is, however, time consuming, need lots of input data, and could not be used for quick decision-making purposes. To decrease the modeling time, this study based on a new version of the Reis drainage model, proposes coupled mathematical model and reserves the effect of geomechanics in the process. Results showed a perfect match with the past experimental and numerical data.

May 1, 2009

By R. J. Johnston

"INTRODUCTIONPoint Mines is located about 65 miles east of Hay River on the South Shore of the Great Slave Lake. It is connected to the Northern Alberta Railway System by the Great Slave Lake Division of CN Railways at Roma Junction, Alberta.The operation started in the fall of 1965 with a capacity of 5000 t.p.d. An addition was put into operation late in 1968 to bring the capacity up to 8000 t.p.d. The present milling rate is 11,000 t.p.d.The location of Pine Point Mines is such that long end cold winters are to be expected end temperatures of lower than -200F are encountered from late October to late March, with extended periods of -300F being common in January and February.It was recognized by Cominco engineers during the initial design period that since freezing would be encountered with open pit ore somewhere in the crushing circuit, the problem was to reduce it as much as possible. Other mines, working under similar conditions, found that the fine ore bins feeding the grinding circuit were the main problem area. The decision was reached, therefore, to have heated fine ore bins and to make sure thst the ore was sufficiently warm to prevent freezing.CRUSHING PLANT FLOWSHEETThe crushing plant has a standard open flow circuit (flowsheet). Ore from the stockpile is loaded into R-50 Euclid trucks by Caterpillar 992 Front End Loader with 11 cu. yd. bucket and dumped into a 42 x 65 C.A.C. Superior Crusher driven by a 300 HP motor. The crusher is set at a nominal 5 inches. The ore falls through into a 100-ton surge bin. There are high level and low level nuclear gauges to allow the primary operator to optimize for optimum orientation."

Jan 1, 1972

By D. Fodor

In Romania, there are significant lignite and brown coal reserves hosted by different regions of the country. The most important lignite bearing zone of the country situated in the North ? West part of Oltenia region and which covers a surface area of 2,500 km2 and host a total reserve of 3.0 billion tons of lignite, of which more than 95% can be exploited by open cast method. The paper deals with the existing geological and mining conditions of the zone , the distribution by mining basins and exploitation perimeters, the open cast working technologies and the economic outcomes obtained throughout the time. Years ago, for the improvement of the economic situation as a whole and in each unit, a large production reorganization, technology update and modernization process was started up. There are described the rehabilitation measures of the technological lines and modernization of the equipments of the production flow-sheet, measures developed at present, too and which will still continue in future. There are mentioned the equipments considered, the components under modernization and the economic outcomes obtained so far. At the end of the paper there are presented the future actions for the equipment modernization and perspectives of the lignite deposit exploitation to meet the national economy requirements of solid fuels.

Aug 1, 2013

By A. Broussaud

The paper describes the advanced grinding control system implemented at Newmont Ahafo gold mine, Ghana in 2009 and 2010. It shows how the different components of the Advanced Process Control (APC) system cooperate for increasing plant performance. The SABC circuit processes hard rock from different pits mixed with a variable proportion of oxides. The control strategy is designed to address specific disturbances, including start/stops of pebble crushers, unavailability of oxides, changes in rock size distribution resulting from segregation in the stockpile, and changes in ore type and hardness. The system consists of an expert system per se with extensive use of fuzzy logic, supplemented by an online dynamic model of the process used as a soft sensor, a VisioRock? rock size measurement system over SAG mill feed before addition of recycled pebbles, and an AudioMill? system to analyze the SAG mill sound and detect impacts on liners. All these components are embedded in the same OCS© software platform, which, among other benefits, makes it easy to support the entire system remotely. The paper details the physical constraints and the variables that are manipulated. It describes the control strategy and the contribution of each component of the system. It also describes the project implementation and the performance of the system. In addition to a strong involvement and support of management, the very good acceptance of the operators has been facilitated by the remote access system that made it possible to immediately modify the system each time it was needed during the baby sitting phase. The system made it possible to increase gold production significantly through increases in tonnage and recovery thanks to a better control of the grind size through a stabilization of the secondary ball milling circuit and an improvement of the operating conditions of the classifying cyclones.

Jan 1, 2012

Energy benchmarking is widely applied across industries to determine the potential to improve energy performance. Unlike the many technologies for which energy benchmarks and efficiency rating systems are already in maturity, benchmarking of mining processes is still in its infancy. Benchmarking energy usage in mining operations, where energy costs are high and represent a significant portion of overall operating expenses, is challenging due to the uniqueness of each mining operation. Mines vary in terms of geology, geographic setting, ore body geometry, mineralogy which impact the mining method, material handling, processing and waste management. In order to gauge the opportunity for reducing the energy intensity of individual operations and also to compare the energy performance of operations on a global scale, the deployment of new benchmarking methodologies, models and frameworks is necessary. As a step towards the establishment of an accurate framework for benchmarking the energy consumption of mining operations, comminution, one of the more energy intensive mining sub-processes, was selected as the focus of a new energy benchmarking method. The methodologies and processes used to onset fragmentation in a rock mass to the crushing or grinding of rock to a size that is suitable for economic extraction are predominantly dependent on the ore properties. For this reason, site specific factors, such as the size reduction requirements and ore hardness were included in an energy benchmark model so that the energy performance of comminution processes at different operations could be normalized and compared on a global scale. Single particle compression breakage has been identified by several prominent researchers in the field of comminution as the upper limit of energy utilization in size reduction processes. For this reason single particle compression breakage was proposed as the basis of a work index for ores to be used as an input for the benchmark model. Overall, the new method showed that the energy benchmark for mineral comminution can be normalized and subsequently compared for a range of mining operations once the ore hardness has been appropriately characterized.

Aug 1, 2013

By Richard C. Banting

Excessive vibration is known to have an adverse affect on soft body tissue and operators of heavy mining equipment can be exposed to vibration that exceeds levels recommended in international guidelines (ISO 2631-1, for example). Research has found that many of the seat and suspension systems currently used in mine haul trucks and load haul dump vehicles are actually amplifying the vibration. This overview presentation will outline the current research being conducted at Laurentian University and the University of Western Ontario, and the roles of partners in rating the ability of a number of commonly used mine vehicle seats to isolate harmful vibration.

Oct 1, 2010

"The most widely used method for predicting the onset of continuous caving is Laubscher’s caving chart. A detailed examination of this method was undertaken which concluded that it had limitations which may impact on results, particularly when dealing with stronger rock masses that are outside current experience. These limitations relate to inadequate guidelines for adjustment factors to rock mass rating (RMR), concerns about the position on the chart of critical case history data, undocumented changes to the method and an inadequate number of data points to be confident of stability boundaries.A review was undertaken on the application and reliability of a numerical method of assessing cavability. The review highlighted a number of issues, which at this stage, make numerical continuum methods problematic for predicting cavability. This is in particular reference to sensitivity to input parameters that are difficult to determine accurately and mesh dependency.An extended version of the Mathews method for open stope design was developed as an alternative method of predicting the onset of continuous caving. A number of caving case histories were collected and analyzed and a caving boundary delineated statistically on the Mathews stability graph. The definition of the caving boundary was aided by the existence of a large and wide-ranging stability database from non-caving mines. A caving rate model was extrapolated from the extended Mathews stability graph but could only be partially validated due to a lack of reliable data."

Jan 1, 2003

By Pritii Tam Wai Yin, Tony Leong, Neetu Bansal, James Vaughan, Amiel Boullemant

Mercury is a toxic element that is associated with many industrial activities including the Bayer process. Mercury is known to enter the Bayer process with the bauxite feed material and has the potential to accumulate as the process solution is recycled. This paper explores the speciation of mercury in Bayer process streams. The process parameters considered are the oxidising-reducing potential, basicity and temperature. The results of a refinery circuit survey are presented and compared with the thermodynamic predictions. Electrochemical measurements on relevant synthetic systems are also included.

Jan 1, 2014

By V. Gangrade

Recirculation is the major concern associated with the utilization of booster fans. In controlled recirculation, a portion of the return air is purposely mixed with the intake air and the mixture is directed towards a working district, while the air quantity and gas concentrations in the air are closely monitored and managed. The objectives of this study were to determine the gas concentration in intake and return airways during controlled recirculation, and to determine the recirculation fraction for multiple headings. Experiments were conducted in a laboratory model to determine the effect of controlled recirculation on the quality of air circulated through the working faces. Preliminary results showed that recirculation is beneficial to ventilation planning because it reduces the build-up of air contaminants at the working faces and reduces the overall power consumptions. The experimental results were used to quantify the recirculation fraction and to calibrate ventilation models of the laboratory model. These models are used to simulate the controlled recirculation and to predict the gas concentrations in multiple headings.

Aug 1, 2013