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Coal mining in Indiana is limited to the south-western portion of the state, with coal currently being recovered in 19 counties. The coal-producing area of the state covers approximately 6,500 square miles. Although most of the coal in Indiana is recovered by surface mining methods, a small percentage is recovered through underground mining. To date, 40 percent of the known coal reserves have been removed. Indiana has about 33 billion tons of identified coal reserves, of which approximately 17 billion tons are recoverable using current technology. Of this recoverable coal, about 15 billion tons are recoverable by underground mining and 2 billion tons are recoverable by surface mining methods. The State of Indiana has regulated the environmental impacts of coal mining since 1941. Indiana was the second state in the nation to pass legislation requiring mined land reclamation. Its SMCRA regulatory program was approved July 29,1982, and its Abandoned Mine Land Program was approved July 29, 1982.

Jan 1, 1992

Study to develop a new and more cost effective equipment system, incorporating a winch-pulled dozer blade, for leveling spoil and performing reclamation of area strip mines.

Jan 1, 1975

By J. Clark

The objective of this study has been to determine the state of the art in underground, thin-seam-mining systems, to identify new technology and procedures that would reduce the hazards of thin-seam mining and to recommend areas for further research. The study was carried out in two phases, the first of these being devoted to a survey of authoritative literature. Subsequently, the practices adopted in the various mining countries were analysed and comparisons made to identify machines and methods with the potential for application in the USA. Published figures on US bituminous coal reserves show the high proportion contained in thin seams and US accident statistics demonstrate that the risk is greater in thin-seam operations. A comparison has been made with the experiences of foreign operations. The Phase 11 study proceeded along two separate avenues to examine the distinctive problems associated with seam thicknesses above and below 30 in. Current systems of mining appropriate to seams greater than 30 in were elaborated and compared by means of a simulation exercise in terms of safety, production and cost. For seams below 30 in, less conventional systems, some presently disused, were studied and their potential evaluated; the research and development work necessary to make them viable has been indicated.

Jan 1, 1980

By B. W. Gandrud

[The Bureau of Mines is conducting an extensive investigation of coal preparation in the Alabama coal fields in cooperation with the University of Alabama and coal-mine operators. In this investigation the drainage characteristics of typical coals from the Warrior and Cahaba n fields were studied. Tire main purposes of this study has been to evaluate no nearly as possible relative influences of certain factors on rate of drainage and to determine whether the drainage characteristics of coals from different beds or from different mines on the soma bed differ materially. A further objective was the development of a laboratory drainage test that would predict approximately the rate at which any coal will drain after having been loaded into a railroad car in a saturated condition. The study has been confined to samples of slack coals - that is, coals from which none of the fine sizes have been removed. The samples ranged in upper size limits from 7/16 inch to 3 inches. It did not seem necessary to study nut and egg sizes, that is, sizes from which the fine coal has been removed by screening, as these lose water so rapidly by natural drainage that they present no serious problem in dewatering after treatment in a washer. The significance of drainage characteristics of Alabama coals is apparent in view of the fact that not less than 70 percent of Alabama?s total coal product is subjected to wet washing before being materials.]

Jan 1, 1941

By Robert V. Spencer

"This report describes an examination and preliminary exploration of the Magnet Cove Rutile Co. property in Hot Spring County, Ark. The company in 1944 was producing titania for use in-the welding-rod and metallurgical industries but later ceased operations. The deposit appeared to contain potential reserves of rutile ore, and the Bureau of lanes in 1945 conducted an examination designed (1) to obtain samples for ore-dressing tests and (2) to gather information regarding the grade, character, and size of the deposit. This report presents the data obtained by geologic mapping, geophysical surveying, churn drilling, and core drilling. Beneficiation tests are being made at the Bureau of Mines Rolla, No. station, on the samples taken and will be discussed in a later report.The Magnet Cove operation had been called to the attention of the Bureau of Mines, and in view of the potential reserve of titanium-bearing material, it was decided to obtain samples for ore-dressing tests. Churn drilling was selected as a means of obtaining representative samples, and geologic mapping and geophysical surveying were done to throw more light on the nature of the deposit. Subsequently, a few holes were core-drilled.The property contains the NE1/4, W1/2 fractional NW1/4 and 82 acres of the N part of SE of sec. 18, and -29 acres of the SW1/4 NW1/4 sec. 17, all in T. 3 S., R. 17 W., Hot Spring County, Ark. The mine and mill are about 1 mile by graveled road northeast of U. S. Highway 270, a paved road connecting Malvern, 10 miles south and Hot Springs, 12 miles west. The area is served by two railroads, the Missouri Pacific, which passes through Malvern and Hot Springs and the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific,,has a line connecting Malvern and Hot Springs an passes about 2 miles south of the property. A natural-gas pipe line and an electric power line reach the property."

Sep 1, 1946

By W. I. Garms

This paper, describing the milling practices at the Hayden concentrator of the Nevada Consolidated Copper Co. is the first of a Series being prepared by the Bureau of Mines on milling methods and costs in various districts of the United States. The Hayden concentrator is located at Hayden, Gila County, Ariz., 20 miles from the mine at Ray, Pinal County, Ariz., and approximately 1-1/2 miles north of the junction of the Gila and San Pedro Rivers. During the fourth quarter of 1928 the concentrator treated daily by flotation an average of 10,336 tons of ore containing 1.25 per cent of copper. The average recovery during this period amounted to 87.84 per cent of the total copper. The concentrates contained 19.88 per cent of copper.

Jan 1, 1930

By R. T. DeWoody, J. W. Chester, W. C. Miller

The work was done to develop a relatively efficient muffler for quieting the exhaust of a rock drill . The exhaust of a pneumatic rock drill is the source of the major part of the noise generated by the drill . The exhaust noise can be reduced in a number of different ways , but this study involved only reactive mufflers . The reactive muffler can be simulated by an electrical circuit . Information obtained from analogous electrical circuits was used to design an efficient exhaust muffler for pneumatic rock drills . Electrical analogies proved to be a valuable tool in the design of mufflers .

Jan 1, 1964

By John P. Powell

The increasing demands for petroleum and its products and the steadily increasing cost of discovering and developing new oil fields are factors that emphasize the importance of increasing the recovery of oil from known petroleum reserves. Water flooding is a valuable conservation measure, not only preventing premature abandonment of stripper leases but also reviving interest in many areas previously abandoned. The use of water flooding as a means for recovering additional oil from partly depleted oil-bearing formations was first tried in Oklahoma in 1931. Early water-flooding operations were confined to the area of shallow Bartlesville-sand formations in Nowata and Rogers Counties, where many of the projects were outstandingly successful. The results of these operations stimulated activities in other pools in Oklahoma, and by the end of 1949 water flooding had been tried in 25 of the 49 oil-producing counties in the State (fig. 1). Approximately 33 million barrels of oil, or 1,806 barrels per acre, had been recovered by December 31, 1949, from 18,221 productive acres included in the 162 active and abandoned projects in Oklahoma by injection of approximately 449 million barrels of water.

Jan 1, 1951

By Sidney Katell

This report, covering the period January 1967 through December 1967, is a continuation of a series that began with the publication of Information Circular 7516 in October 1949. It is the ninth in a series of reports prepared in cooperation with the American Association of Cost Engineers. The abstracted articles are concerned with all phases of cost engineering in the field of chemical and petroleum plants and related subjects. They are from the following sources: 1. American Association of Cost Engineers Bulletin. 2. Bureau of Mines Information Circulars. 3. Bureau of Mines Reports of Investigations. 4. Chemical Engineering. 5. Chemical Engineering Progress. 6. Chemical Week.

Jan 1, 1968

By Dale Marcy, Pamela L. Drake, Kevin Ashley, Kyle J. Hazelwood

National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health method 7703 is a portable field procedure for the analysis of workplace air filter samples for hexavalent chromium (CrVI) content immediately after the samples are collected. The field method prescribes CrVI extraction from air filter samples with an ammonium sulfate/ammonium hydroxide extraction buffer using ultrasonic extraction (UE). Strong anion-exchange solidphase extraction (SAE-SPE) is then used to separate CrVI from trivalent chromium and other interferences. Portable spectrophotometric measurement of CrVI is then conducted using the 1,5-diphenylcarbazide (DPC) method. However, it has been found that the ammonium extraction buffer does not dequately bring insoluble CrVI compounds into solution during the UE process. Thus, it was deemed necessary to modify the field method so that it would provide acceptable recoveries for insoluble CrVI compounds. To this end, a more alkaline extraction solution—sodium carbonate/sodium bicarbonate buffer—was investigated. The modified procedure using the highly alkaline extraction solution was demonstrated to be compatible with SAE-SPE cartridges when determining insoluble CrVI in air filter samples. It was found that the carbonate/bicarbonate buffer was equally effective for complete dissolution of both insoluble and soluble forms of CrVI. Furthermore, the modified procedure met desired performance criteria established for air sampling and analytical methods. Keywords: field method, hexavalent chromium, insoluble chromates, on-site analysis, sample preparation,workplace air

By Ovsei Volberg

Motion capture involves recording the position and global orientation of joint sensors of a real object, in most cases a real person performing some human activities. This information is usually recorded at uniformly spaced instances of time, or as it is often called frame-by-frame. Then the recorded motion data sets are processed and mapped into a skeleton hierarchy of a virtual, computer simulated human figure to control the motion of the virtual human in the computer simulation. In the first part of the paper we review several new techniques developed to facilitate the manipulation, noise reduction, storage and reuse of captured data, which have a potential to reduce the overall cost of motion simulation and improve its realism. In the second part of the paper we consider the real life problem of reducing a worker?s risk from being hit by underground mining machinery in a confined space. We formulate a set of requirements to motion editing for this particular task and analyze the limitation of existing techniques

Jan 1, 2000

By Paul M. Ambrose

ADVANCES in mining and processing technology made it possible to reopen the De Beers diamond mine in South Africa, originally located in 1871 by Cecil Rhodes and closed in 1908. Radioactive material was used to indicate the efficiency of hydro-cyclones used in diamond concentration. Added interest was shown in recovering diamond from the sea off the coast of South-West Africa. Production of crude artificial abrasives declined because demand was paritally met by withdrawals from stocks. The value of graded grain-coated abrasives and grinding wheels surpassed those of 1962.

Jan 1, 1964

By E. W. Felegy

Since 1920, the Bureau of Mines and, other agencies have conducted numerous investigations of methods of communication for use in mines in times of disaster or emergency. The results of these investigations have been reported in various publications (3, 4; 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16). In November 1944, the Bureau of Mines resumed the study of emergency underground communications. Until March 1946, the program was directed toward reexamining methods of underground communication that indicated possibilities of success. Since April 1946, the principal interest of this investigation has been in methods of application of radio to communication in mines, low-frequency radio seeming to offer the most promise as a successful method of emergency mine communication. Results achieved in reexamining other methods and in the investigation or the application of low-frequency radio between November 1944 and September 1946 were reported previously in a publication entitled "Some Studies on Emergency Mine Communications".

Jan 1, 1948

By D. A. Reynolds

THIS REPORT gives results of an investigation of the carbonizing properties of two Tennessee coals, one from the Jellico bed in Campbell County and the other from the Sewanee bed in Marion County. Jellico coal and blends with 20 and 30 percent Pocahontas No. 3 coal were carbonized at 800° and 900° C. by the BM-AGA method. Sewanee coal was carbonized by the same method at 800°, 900°, and 1,000° C.; blends with coals of similar and different ranks were carbonized at 800° and 900° C. The coals were subjected to various physical and chemical tests, including complete chemical analyses, low-temperature assays, and agglutinating, free-swelling, friability, plasticity, and expansion tests. The Tennessee coal field is a part of the Appalachian field, which extends from northern Pennsylvania to central Alabama. The Jelico bed, one of the most important in the State, is part of the Jellico formation, which is above the Lee formation of the Lower Pottsville. Sewanee coal bed belongs to the Sewanee conglomerate and is stratigraphically lower than the Jellico bed.

Jan 1, 1953

By C. C. Popoff

The Dunkleberg district is in the Flint Creek Range of the northern Rocky Mountains, about 45 miles northwest of Butte, Mont. Silver - lead and zinc mineralization occurs over an area 4 miles long from north to south and 1 to 2 miles wide from west to east. Ore in appreciable quantity has been produced, mostly from the Forest Rose group of mines in the southern part of the district. The Forest Rose mine was the largest producer of lead and the Wasa mine, a mile farther south, the main producer of zinc. The total output of ore from these properties during World War II was 113,000 tons, or 98.2 percent of the total recorded production of the district. The Wasa mine was examined by a Bureau of Mines engineer2/ in 1944. Subsequent investigations during 1946, 1947, and 1948 included trenching and drilling Fn the Wasa area and examination of the Forest Rose and other mines.

Jan 1, 1953

By R. Havens

During investigations of the occurrence of manganese in the western United States in the early 1940?s, examining engineers of the Bureau of Mines collected samples from seven claims and mines in southern Arizona. For convenience in reporting the results, the work on the properties is grouped in three districts. As the ores were too low grade to be acceptable to producers of ferromanganese, beneficiation studies were made to determine the amenability of the ores to concentration. The San Fernando group is about 10.5 miles south of Patagonia in the Harshaw mining district. G. T. Humphries and D. Alonso held an option on the property, which was owned by H. Bender. Two samples were taken; 1 was a picked sample and the other a representative sample of ore as exposed in the mine.

Jan 1, 1954

By Oliver C. Ralston

[The NOJ'l..metals Division deals wi tt mi:leral n t inte .ded to be used a ra\o,f materials for extraction of metals. ~ _ ereas, a. materinl containing a chromite, if used' for production of c~1r()rrti1..1r.'l ::tetE' .. l or fcrrochromiu"1, 1,oJould be a chromi te ore, if used as 8. rcfrn.cto~J or for prod .1.ction of chromium chemicals, it is a chromi te-beari [. ~?oCl... Li;{eHise, a r:1a&neti te used for production of iron is a metallifero"'..ls ~in8re..i; if used 8.S a water-filtration granule in .:l magne.tically cleaned filter bed, it 'ould be a nonmetallic in-dustrial mineral.]

Jan 1, 1940

By D. H. Yardley

A major purpose of this contract was to evaluate a variety of dust suppressants to determine their effectiveness in mitigating dust from taconite tailings. During the course of the investigation tailings from pilot-plant tests of Minnesota copper-nickel ores became available and chemical binders were also tested for dust mitigation effectiveness on this mineralogically different material. Field-test plots were established on taconite tailings and wind tunnel laboratory tests conducted. The laboratory tests consisted of comparing treated and untreated samples at wind velocities of 40 mph using a weight-loss method and direct dust emission measurements. It was shown that the emission of fine dust from taconite tailings, in the range of 4.5 microns to 0.85 microns, could be reduced by 99 percent using certain chemical suppressants. It was also demonstrated that a straight water spray on coarse tailings (3/4" to + 10 mesh) reduced dust emission by 95 percent. Although eight different chemicals were tested, most of the tests were made using Coherex, ammonium lignin sulfonate and sodium silicate. These same dust suppressants were used, singly and in combination on almost 75 field-test plots. The Coherex appears to provide the best results in terms of economics and durability. Wind tunnel tests on treated and untreated Cu-Ni tailings demonstrated that applications of dust suppressants reduced fugitive fine dust by better than 99 percent.

Jan 1, 1980

By Glenn A. Shirey

The objective of this contract as to prepare a detailed, readily usable handbook on dust control techniques for longwall mining operations. Information was gathered from available literature, and through contacts with industry and government personnel. The handbook describes those methods of dust control applicable to today's longwall mining systems, and contains sufficient design elements to assist operators with problems in testing or implementing new control procedures. Complete reference lists are presented at the end of each chapter to direct the reader to additional information.

Jan 1, 1985

The Waukon iron deposit comprises about 210 acres situated 2-1/2 miles north of Waukon, in Allamakee County, northeastern Iowa. The deposits have been exploited intermittently since 1899 and have produced about 67,000 tons of concentrated iron ore. From January to May 1943, the Bureau of Mines investigated the deposit to determine the extent of the ore-bearing material and its amenability to concentration, Seventy-one test pits were sunk. Those that indicated are of a grade high enough to warrant concentration tests were sampled. Average grade of ore was indicated to be 37.02 percent iron and 27.78 percent silica on a dry basis. Beneficiation tests indicated that the percentage of recovery might be relatively low.

Jan 1, 1949