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By E. Marcotte

"Technology developments and improvements are imperative to maintain a viable mineral processing industry. In order to achieve optimum implementation of technology in processing plants, safety conscious and efficient work forces are required. Effective management methods are required to prevent employee injuries, equipment or environmental damage and process losses. Good leadership also provides for employees to perform their work in the safest and most efficient manners to attain optimum recoveries of the valuable minerals and produce high quality mill products. Equipment and processes must be designed, operated and maintained as required to assure safe and efficient mineral processing.INTRODUCTIONThe Canadian mining industry must contend with many challenges to attain and maintain a competitive position in today's global market. Canadian Mineral Processors play a vital role in meeting the challenges and achieving optimum mineral productivity.Ongoing technology developments and improvements continue to be imperative to maintain a viable mineral processing industry. The efficient implementation of technology developments requires a safety conscious, skillful and productive work force.In addition to technical and human resources, challenges may also include governments, labour unions or environmental advocates who at times may appear to be misguided or unrealistic. Canadian Mineral Processors must not allow themselves to be overwhelmed by these apparent obstacles but must use their demonstrated ingenuity to achieve successful solutions.It should be recognized that the majority of the Canadian work force are, in fact, a potentially talented and skillful people with ambitions to excel. As leaders of people, we must provide the methodology, incentive and direction that will allow our work forces to realize their ambitions. If the potentials of our work forces are not recognized and leadership is not properly exercised much loss will occur. That is, safe effective and efficient work will not be achieved."

Jan 1, 1993

By Gordon. I. M., J. Blackshaw

"The wet part of the Hollinger mill is housed in two buildings, the grinding plant and the treatment plant. In the grinding plant there are four 7xl5 ball mills which grind the ore to 60 per cent through 200 mesh. There is also one 7xl5 ball mill which grinds table concentrate to 9 5 per cent through 200 mesh.The primary classifier overflow is pumped to the treatment plant where it passes over shaking tables, producing a concentrate and a tail. The concentrate pulp is pumped to the grinding plant for secondary grinding. The secondary classifier overflow is pumped back to the treatment plant where it is thickened in two 40xl 5 tray thickeners and agitated in four 20x24 mechanical agitators arranged in series of two (with 2 spares).The table tail pulp is thickened in nine primary 40xl5 tray thickeners (with 2 spares). The thickened table tail pulp and the concentrate agitator discharge pulp are mixed and pumped to four rows of 15x45 pachuca agitators, arranged in series of five tanks.The pachuca discharge pulp is divided. The smaller part goes to two rows of 3-step decantation using 40xl5 tray thickeners (with 2 spare rows). The larger part goes to six 14xl6 drum filters. The repulped primary filter cake and the thickened pulp discharged from the decantation rows are fed to eight 14xl6 drum filters. The secondary filter cake is mixed with water and pumped to the tailing line."

Jan 1, 1968

By J. Fournier

A novel sol ? gel (SG) synthesis procedure utilizing varying ratios of glycine and ethylene glycol to total metal cations has been developed to create high purity nanometer sized La0.65Sr3.5MnO3 powders. X-ray powder diffraction (XRD), transmission and scanning electron microscopy (TEM, SEM), and dynamic light scattering (DLS) have confirmed that the crystallite sizes of such powders are ~ 20 nm, and the aggregate particle sizes vary between 100 to 300 nm. Mixing varying weight percents of SG LSM powders with commercially available Praxair LSM in a composite LSM/YSZ functionally graded cathode has been shown, through the use of electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) and cyclic voltammetry (CV), to exhibit enhanced oxygen reduction kinetics vs. at conventional cathode materials.

Jan 1, 2005

By L. Sun

Recently, micro-tubular solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs) have attracted the attention of many researchers because of their numerous advantages over larger tubular and planar SOFCs. These include excellent thermal shock properties giving rapid startup/shutdown capability, a high volumetric power density compared to larger tubular SOFCs, and reduced sealing problem compared to planar SOFCs. In order to screen cathode materials for micro-tubular SOFCs, the perovskite cathodes were deposited, using a variety of methods, on 10.5 mol % yttria-stabilized zirconia (YSZ) tubes. Their electrochemical properties were then evaluated by using electrochemical impedance spectroscopy and steady-state polarization methods, based on a three electrode configuration, and with the reference electrode position carefully optimized. The oxygen reduction reaction kinetics at the cathode/electrolyte half cell were then investigated in detail.

Jan 1, 2005

RISKGATE is an interactive online risk management system developed by the Minerals Industry Safety and Health Centre (MISHC; University of Queensland) to assist the mining industry in implementing continual improvement in management of major unwanted events, and so maximising health and safety performance. A comprehensive body of knowledge has been compiled from diverse mining industry experts for risk management of tyres, collisions, fires, isolation, strata underground, ground control open cut, explosions, explosives, manual tasks and slips/trips/falls. This paper presents an overview of the body of knowledge captured from diverse mining industry experts for the management of unwanted strata incidents, and explosions in the underground environment. This knowledge is divided into a series of initiating events within both topics (as listed) with further degrees of classification based on design, operation, and management concerns. Strata Underground Initiating Events: Explosions Initiating Events Loss of strata control at longwall face Fire or ignition in a sealed area Loss of strata control in outbye roadways Fire or ignition in an unsealed goaf area Loss of strata control in roadways under development Fire or ignition in an extraction face Loss of control of overburden and caving behavior Fire or ignition in outbye Loss of pillar system stability Loss of control of goaf edge in pillar extraction Fire or ignition in a development panel or first working Loss of strata control in shafts The system guides the user in generating substantive and leading edge controls to assist industry stakeholders in the design, management and reporting of organisational and regulatory compliance requirements. From a broader industry perspective, RISKGATE provides an environment for knowledge capture and knowledge exchange to drive innovation and best practice in the identification, assessment and management of risk. By capturing operational knowledge from industry experts, RISKGATE provides a cumulative corporate memory at a time of high personnel turnover in the coal industry.

Aug 1, 2013

By Dani J. Alldrick, Alastair J. Sinclair, Colin I. Godwin

"The Stewart mining camp has a long history of precious and base metal mining. The camp is abundantly mineralized, with more than 200 widespread, varied, vein prospects, deposits and orebodies. These show wide variations in the mineralogy of ore, gangue and alteration assemblages, and wide variations in textures and structural settings. This report establishes the timing of the different metallogenic epochs and suggests a specific exploration application for systematic leadisotope analyses.Galena lead isotope ratios from a range of mineral occurrences indicate that all these varied deposits formed during two main mineralizing events. Lead isotope data from the Stewart mining camp do not provide absolute ages for the formation of mineral deposits, but the relative distributions of data are consistent with dates determined in other studies. One ore-forming episode occurred in the Early Jurassic and the other in the Middle Eocene. Both metallogenic epochs were brief, regional-scale phenomena. Some deposits from the younger mineralizing episode were emplacedadjacent to or superimposed on the older deposits.Field and laboratory studies show that the two metallogenic epochs are characterized by different base and precious metal suites: Early Jurassic gold-silver-zinc-lead-copper; and Middle Eocene silver-lead-zinc. Therefore, showings of different ages have different base and precious metal potentials and deserve different exploration emphasis. Lead isotope studies provide a reliable, cost-effective method for evaluating the age and commodity potential of small or recently discovered mineral showings and for setting exploration priorities on properties with several varied mineral occurrences. The determination of the age and metal potential of a prospect at an early stage of exploration may govern the urgency, intensity or even the necessity for further exploration work."

Jan 1, 1993

By Simon P. Fricker

Gold drugs have been used for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis since the mid 20th century as disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs (DMARD) class. Methotrexate is often the preferred DMARD, and with the advent of new therapies gold drugs are now used infrequently. Since the introduction of auranofin in 1985 there has been no new clinically approved gold drug. In spite of this apparent lack of progress there has been a great deal of interest in the use of gold compounds for cancer therapy and early promising indications were achieved with a gold phosphine complex [Au(dppe)2]Cl. This compound was not entered for clinical trials, however, due to problems with cardiotoxicity highlighted during pre-clinical toxicology studies. Gold(III) is isoelectronic (d8) with platinum(II) and likewise forms square planar complexes. It is therefore tempting to speculate that such complexes would have similar antitumor activity to cisplatin. In order to stabilise the gold(III) oxidation cycloaurated complexes were synthesised with a single mononegative bidentate ligand, damp, (2-[(dimethylamino)methyl]phenyl), and two monodentate anionic ligands e.g. Cl or acetate. The damp ligand forms part of a five-membered chelate ring. The monodentate ligands are readily hydrolysed and are available for substitution. These compounds had limited anti-tumor activity in in vivo against human tumor xenografts. Mechanistic studies indicated that these compounds had a different mechanism of action to cisplatin. An alternative molecular target for these compounds is biologically important thiol-containing molecules such as the cysteine protease cathepsin B. Modifications were made to the Au(III) damp structure to give compounds with a six-membered chelate ring. These compounds were shown to be inhibitors of cathepsin B. Compounds were also tested for cytotoxicity against a panel of human tumor cell lines. Three compounds were selected for further evaluation against a human colon tumor xenograft. The compounds showed modest anti-tumor activity but with no marked improvement over the parent Au(III)damp complexes. Initial indications are that Au(III) compounds targeted against disease-specific thiol-containing biological molecules have potential as drugs, particularly for cancer. However, further work is required to produce a target-specific drug with a suitable pharmacological activity and toxicity profile.

Oct 1, 2003

By U. Dillon, G. Blackwell

"Geographic information systems (GIS) provide an efficient means for the recording, manipulation, revision, display and analysis of spatially referenced data. GIS are widely used at the exploration stage of mine development, and are increasingly used for reclamation planning. The ability of a GIS to perform spatial searches and query spatially referenced data make it a powerful tool for use at all stages of mine development. As the amount of data available for analysis increases, so does the power and flexibility of GIS as a planning tool.Starting from the exploration database, this paper describes how a GIS can be used for the development of mining plans based on topography, geology and mineralization information stored in a relational database. Planning decisions approaching the optimal can then be made for a wide range of parameters, including stockpile and waste dump locations, the location of potentially acid generating and neutralizing material for dump design, profitable and risk-controlled mine extraction sequencing, and haul road locations. This is made possible by the overlay and buffer analysis capabilities of a GIS which are explored and exploited to produce a continuous mine production planning program, as well as site remediation and reclamation using a successful case study. The Ore and ProductsThe mines in the Saskatoon area — Agrium, PCS-Cory, PCS-Allan, PCS-Patience Lake, PCS-Lanigan and IMC-Colonsay — extract the ore from the Patience Lake member. The mines in the southeast corner of Saskatchewan — IMC-K1 and K2, PCSRocanville — extract from the Esterhazy member, while IMC-Belle Plaine, near Regina, solution mines potassium chloride from both potash-bearing members.Ore from the Patience Lake member is a medium-grained mixture of sylvite and halite, with a KCl content of 36%, insolubles averaging up to 5.5%, and little or no carnallite.The ore from the Esterhazy member is a coarse-grained mixture of sylvite (KCl) and halite (NaCl) with a small amount of water insolubles, and some carnallite (a K-Mg chloride). Average run-of-mine grades are about 30% KCl."

Jan 1, 2003

By V. I. Birss

Planar solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs) offer great promise as stationary power generation devices, primarily due to their flexibility in terms of fuels, high energy conversion efficiency (when both electricity and heat are captured), and their relatively low fabrication costs. However, the anode performance can be compromised by such factors as exposure to certain sulfur-containing fuels and the deposition of coke when using hydrocarbon fuels. In terms of the cathode, its performance is limited primarily by the slow kinetics of the oxygen reduction reaction, while its lifetime can be negatively affected by factors related to the corrosion of currently used stainless steel interconnect materials. This talk will present an overview of these challenges and some possible solutions to these problems. The presentation will also focus on how electrochemical methods can be used to evaluate and improve the performance of SOFC anodes, cathodes, and interconnect materials. In addition, recent promising research efforts directed towards performance enhancement of SOFCs through the use of nanoscale electrocatalysts will be discussed.

Jan 1, 2005

"The Dome Mine, located in South Porcupine Ont. has been in operation since 1910 and is owned and operated by Placer Dome Inc. The current milling facilities were constructed in two phases with the first being commissioned in 1982. It consists of a grinding, gravity separation, thickening, and leaching circuits. The second phase was commissioned in 1988 with the addition of the CIP, stripping, electrowinning, and carbon regeneration circuits.It is now common practice in the gold processing community to add liquid oxygen to leach circuits to increase both recovery and kinetics. Along with these benefits the metallurgical group at the Dome realized the potential to replace compressed air with liquid oxygen as a source of oxygen for the dissolution of gold. A plant trial of liquid oxygen was undertaken during the fall of 1991. The results of this first test were favourable enough to warrant further investigation, and a second plant trial was conducted in December 1991.The data generated as a result of each trial revealed that oxygen could be economically substituted for compressed air as a source of dissolved 02. The energy savings in required horsepower enabled a rapid payback period. Thus the project was approved in the spring of 1992 and l should be operational during the final quarter of 1992. INTRODUCTIONIn a continuing effort to reduce operating costs and improve recovery at the Dome mill it was decided to investigate the feasibility of adding liquid oxygen (02) to the leach circuit. It is now common practice in the gold processing community to add 02 to the leaching process to increase both kinetics and recovery. It was anticipated that an increase in kinetics would allow us to eliminate one or more leach tanks while maintaining acceptable recoveries. The metallurgical group felt that along with these benefits, the potential was also there to reduce power consumption through the reduction in the processing of compressed air which is quite costly (12 cents/1000 cubic feet per minute in 1991)."

Jan 1, 1993

By Anne-Laure Bonnet

Les connaissances acquises au cours des dernières décennies sur les gîtes de métaux de base et précieux intensément métamorphisés (p. ex. Vokes, 1991; Cornell et al., 1992; Zaleski et Peterson, 1995) ont permis d?élaborer des guides d?exploration pour de tels gisements dans les terrains de haut-grade métamorphique (Spry et Scott, 1986; Rubin et al., 1993; Hand et al., 1994; Spry, 2000; Spry et al., 2000). Un transfert de ces connaissances à la cartographie des vastes terrains gneissiques non différentiés de la province de Grenville permet d?affiner l?approche cartographique nécessaire pour reconnaître les systèmes hydrothermaux métamorphisés en terrains vierges et peu diagnostiques puis d?en discriminer les divers halos d?altération (Corriveau et al.,1996, 1997, 1998, 2003; Williamson et al., ce volume). Cette approche prend en compte les « empreintes métamorphiques » observées sur le terrain, telles que les variations des assemblages minéralogiques, du mode et de la composition des minéraux métamorphiques, pour reconnaître des roches présentant une composition inhabituelle caractéristiques de protolites altérés par hydrothermalisme. Ces empreintes citées cidessus sont facilement reconnaissables dans les terrains de haut-grade où la recristallisation induit un grossissement des grains qui permet de déterminer la nature et le mode des minéraux dès les levés de terrain. Cette approche raffine la compréhension des terrains de haut-grade métamorphique et illustre que leur complexité (i.e. polyphasage de la déformation et du métamorphisme) n?est pas forcément une limite à leur exploration. Elle a donc été utilisée systématiquement lors des levés de terrain réalisés dans le cadre d?un projet de l?Initiative géoscientifique ciblée de RNCan. La zone cartographiée se situe le long de la marge sudest du Groupe de Wakeham dans le secteur est de la Province de Grenville. Deux régions ont été plus particulièrement étudiées, celle du lac Musquaro (SNRC 12K10, 11 et 14) et la région côtière comprise entre Kégashka, La Romaine et Baie des Loups (SNRC 12K1, 2, 3 et 7) (fig. 1).

May 1, 2003

By Aalbert Zwijnenburg

One of problems connected with the use of gold/titania-based catalyst systems is the low yield in propene oxide (up to 2 wt %). It is shown that the low propene oxide yield is due to product inhibition. New options for propene epoxidation with hydrogen and oxygen are discussed. INTRODUCTION The direct gas-phase synthesis of propene oxide (PO), by the use of molecular oxygen, is still aimed for. Agbased catalysis is in principle possible, but selectivity at present is not promising. Highly dispersed gold on titanium containing catalysts show an extraordinary selectivity in the oxidation of propene to the corresponding epoxide (> 99 %), using a combination of H2 and O2 as oxidation mixture [1]. Additional studies of the epoxidation reaction have indicated several drawbacks of the Au/TiO2 catalyst. Firstly, the low conversion (1- 2 %) obtained under typical reaction conditions (atmospheric pressure, 323 - 423 K) cannot be increased by increasing the reaction temperature, because this leads to extensive by-product formation. Secondly, the low efficiency of hydrogen (relatively large amounts of water are formed) is hard to prevent. Finally, significant deactivation of Au/TiO2 catalysts within several hours on stream has been observed. Deactivation can be almost completely prevented by using dispersed TiO2 supports, such as TiO2/SiO2 and Titanium-Silicalite-1 (TS-1) [2]. In recent literature [2,3] a hydroperoxide-like intermediate has been proposed to be responsible for the selective epoxidation. This oxidising species is said to be formed over gold and subsequently used for epoxidation over the Ti-containing support. The support is responsible for the slow desorption of PO. One of the problems for future industrial application might be the low yield in propene oxide. Furthermore, the presence of minor amounts of by-products, not detected on lab-scale catalyst testing, might complicate the separation unit in an industrial process. The reason for the low PO yield over Au/TiO2-based catalysts will be discussed in this paper. Temperature Programmed Desorption (TPD) and micro-flow experiments have been carried out to study PO desorption and catalyst performance, respectively. A catalytic cycle is proposed together with its consequences for the maximum yield in PO. Finally, several process and catalyst options are discussed in view of potential future industrial application.

Oct 1, 2003

By Erol Yilmaz

This poster presents results obtained from an experimental test set-up called CUAPS (curing under applied pressure system) allowing to assess the performance and quality of cemented paste backfill (CPB) materials. CUAPS can be used for carrying out a series of tests: one-dimensional consolidation, saturated hydraulic conductivity, pore-water pressure dissipation, and curing under uniaxial stress. The poster presents CUAPS testing preliminary results including uniaxial compression tests (UCS) and mercury intrusion porosimetry (MIP). It was demonstrated that CUAPS-consolidated CPB materials cured under time-dependent stresses provide higher UCS values than standard mould (undrained and unconsolidated) CPB samples. This may be explained by the release of excess pore water within backfill that gives rise to a significant reduction in the total porosity of fresh CPB materials prior to hardening and thus, to higher mechanical strength (UCS) gain. The results obtained from MIP highlighted a good correlation between CUAPSconsolidated and mould-unconsolidated CPB samples. MIP results were also related to UCS values in order to predict the final CPB mechanical strength.

Nov 1, 2008

By Haibin Wang, Zhiwei Huang, Zhixiang Cui, Wenzhao Cui, Zhi Wang

Fangyuan Two-Step copper smelting process was commercialized in October, 2015 and has been operating for 3 years and 5 months. As the unique continuous copper smelting process with simplified flow in the world, production parameters have been significantly improved after three years. In the first half of 2018, the feed rate was above 200t/h, availability reached 97.5%, operation cost was about 20% lower than the conventional three-step processes showing obvious economic advantages. The Two-Step process in Fangyuan is composed of 1 Submerged Lance Smelting furnace (SLS) and 2 Submerged Lance Converting& Refining furnaces (SLCR). Two SLCRs work alternatively to ensure continuous production. High grade and liquid matte from the SLS is introduced to the SLCR by sealed launder to complete converting and refining. The SLCR is an original and independent innovation of Fangyuan, for which Fangyuan completed lots of development and improvement. This paper will introduce the process and experience. INTRODUCTION China is the largest producer and consumer of refined copper. Most of the processes adopted in China are conventional "Three-Step" copper smelting processes, which are comprised of smelting, converting and refining. There exists some problems in the conventional processes, such as high energy consumption, large heat loss, low altitude emission of SO2, etc. To deal with these problems, Fangyuan developed the new copper smelting process with simplified flow, low cost, clean and high efficiency. The SLCR that combines converting and the refining process was also developed, which shortens the process flow from conventional three steps to two steps. The SLCR is of great significance in promoting the development of the copper industry. Development and industrialization of SLCR At present, copper concentrates are treated in three steps: smelting, converting and refining. Anodes are also produced by continuous converting processes such as the Mitsubishi process and the Double Flash process. Problems like matte transportation by ladle, capacity limitation, and low altitude pollution exist.

Jan 1, 2019

By Leibniz University, D. Zapf

"The demand for gas storage operations with high withdrawal rates and operation modes different to a seasonal storage regime requires a more detailed rock mechanical consideration of thermal induced stresses in the vicinity of the caverns. This means that the change of gas temperatures during operation and the consequences of these temperature changes on the stressing of the salt rock mass must be taken into account in the rock mechanical dimensioning. Within the rock mechanical calculations a loading history, i.e. a pressure versus time dependency, has to be defined. As rock salt has a time dependent material behavior stress redistributions in the rock salt mass take place even under constant internal pressure conditions. Therefore not only withdrawal and filling periods but also the duration of phases with nearly constant internal pressure is significant for the resulting state variables. Within the paper the differences and consequences for the rock mechanical recommendations are discussed. As a result it can be concluded that recommendations with respect to minimum operation pressure as well as for maximum withdrawal rates can be answered only in connection with the respective time intervals."

Jan 1, 2015

By J. Koponen, K. S. Stadler, A. Fuerst, S. Gaulocher, Th. von Hoff, R. Veldsman

"Gearless mill drives (GMDs) are the workhorse in the mineral processing industries, more specifically when it comes to grinding crushed ore and cement (in various production stages) in semiautogenous (SAG) mills and large ball mills. They are renowned for their excellent reliability and robustness, long lifespan, and little need for maintenance, and thus yield a low total cost of ownership (TCO).A GMD represents a major investment for a mineral processing plant, and its availability is pivotal for the grinding process. As a basic rule, shut-down periods are to be minimized, but even much more important is that unscheduled shut-downs be avoided. In this contribution, we will present a portfolio of innovative remote diagnostic that consist of the following three key components:1. Trouble shooting is a form of corrective maintenance and is based on state-of-the art remote access technology, thus enabling highly skilled engineers to access the current sensor readings anytime and from anywhere in order to resolve urgent problems together with the GMD user.2. Periodic maintenance reports are a form of preventive and predictive maintenance and aim at continuous improvement based on long-term historical records and analyses of multiple measured signals. These detailed reports highlight the health and operational status of the GMD and are periodically (e.g. 3 months) submitted to the customer.3. Remote condition monitoring spans across preventive and predictive maintenance and is based on continuous recording and automatic analyses of relevant signals using advanced algorithms. The main issue is how to handle the enormous flood of data in an intelligent manner. The results of these analyses are made available to both the GMD user and supplier in real time in order to increase the availability and reliability of the GMD.In this paper, we consider various parts of the GMD, e.g. the cycloconverter, the ring motor, the auxiliary devices (e.g. cooling and lubrication systems), and also phenomena related to the mill itself (e.g. state and quantity of charge). The signal analysis techniques range from simple threshold-based analyses to complex time and frequency domain analyses. We will illustrate the benefits of the proposed approaches with some selected examples."

Jan 1, 2012

By Carlos Nieble

Ferteco Mineracao, belonging to the CVRD group, is one of the several iron ore mines in the south east of Brazil. Some of these mines have pit walls of over 350-m height and operations under difficult geo-technical conditions are steadily increasing. In order to mine the 15 million tonnes of high grade hematitic ore remaining in the Fabrica pit, Ferteco had to deal with the following restrictions: Warrant power to its concentrator and pellet plant, relocate the load-out rail road loop, stabilise a poor phillyte slope, relocate a creek on a bench, lower the water table and mine at maximum angles at a slope with phillyte and loose itabirites directly under the rail road loop. Considering these aspects, 3 stages of operations were designed, considering a safe operation, but with the lowest possible security factors at the last mining stage, before the pit would be filled in again with tailings. Stage one above the rail road loop and below the high tension power mast, where the poor phillyte slope was secured by a flexible retaining wall, using old rails and anchors up to 27 meters (80ft) with a working pressure of up till 30 tonnes and stage two with different slope angles, and deep wells, high wall blasting perpendicular to the highwall with relief holes and rerouting the creek in steel half culvert and stage three, the filling in with tailings and recuperation of the deep well pumps. Following studies and analysis were made: Geotechnical and geological studies of all rock formations including rock strength test, a hydrological study to define the lowering of the ground water level, slope stability analysis for every bench and all possible combination of benches, definition of blasting parameters close to the pit slope, a monitoring plan, including topographical movements, vibrations due to blasting, piezometers and pressure cells as well as a plan how to fill up the pit again with tailings in combination with the rising of the ground water level. A close co-operation between the geo-technical consultant, pit operations, the blasting contractor and the geological department resulted in an operation without any incidents, lowering the pit with an additional 3 benches and mining an additional 5 million tonnes of high grade ore.

May 1, 2003

By Ross Gilders, Leo Cheung, C. David Desjardins

"For the past twenty years significant progress has been made in bacterial leaching. In fact, a recent article in the Northern Miner has cited that nearly all new copper production is based on bioleaching. The bacteria that play the predominant role in bioleaching is an obligate chemolithoautotroph called thiobacillus ferrooxidans. These bacteria thrive in areas rich in sulphide and prefer low acid media. In the simplest sense, they metabolize sulphide converting it to sulphate either as acid or as soluble metal sulphates. This process is well known because these bacteria generate acid mine water. Over the last five( 5) years, we have been carrying out development work on creating optimum bioleach conditions for the extraction of metals from sulphide rich ores and concentrates. Recently, a study was carried out on a byproduct sulphide concentrate produced in a tin flowsheet developed for the Mt. Pleasant Mine of ADEX Mining Corp. The objective was to determine whether a bioleach process might successfully leach this sulphide material which contains copper, zinc, iron and, what is more important, trace metals such as Indium, Gallium, and Bismuth. The current work describes the successful recovery of these metals achieving extractions of more than 80% by applying bioleaching techniques. An overview of this technical program forms the basis of this paper.IntroductionBio-Oxidation of metal sulphides has emerged to be one of the leading edge hydrometallurgical processes for the economic extraction of metals from ore and concentrates. The fundamental process involves the bacterial assisted oxidation of sulphide to sulphate yielding metal sulphates which can be subsequently leached by conventional means. The bacteria that play the predominate role is an obligate chemolithoautotroph named thiobacillus ferrooxidans (TF). These bacteria thrive in areas rich in sulphide and occur naturally worldwide. In fact, TF is responsible for generating acid in water (acid mine water) from exposed sulphide surfaces primarily through the oxidation of pyrite. TF bacteria thrive under the proper conditions of temperature and oxygen supply in the presence of sulphides and populations in excess of a million per millilitre (ml) of solution are achievable. Typically, at room temperature, the bacteria will bio-oxidize in a pH range of 1.0 to 3.0. Today, bio-oxidation has been applied commercially with great success for the extraction of uranium, copper, and gold."

Jan 1, 1996

By T. Donkin, B. Patterson, M. I. Guthrie, J. T. Ross

"Interest in the use of particle-based ore sorting has increased significantly with recent advances in sorting technologies and higher capacities per unit. Particle-based ore sorting has the potential to provide great value in processing lower grade ores from mines while delivering higher grades to the mill, as well as in upgrading waste rock into ore. Typically the focus is on the amenability of the ore to ore sorting and associated reductions in energy, water, and consumables utilization. However, layout significantly affects the installed cost of a processing plant, and the impacts on layout from fitting an ore sorting circuit into the plant plan need to be carefully considered. This paper examines processing plant layout considerations that play an important role in ore sorting projects, including additional crushing and screening requirements, transport of rejected material back to the waste stockpile (mine fleet requirements), and effects on the processing plant footprint. ¦ KEYWORDS Cold climates, Ore sorting, Plant layout RÉSUMÉ L’intérêt porté à l’utilisation du tri granulométrique du minerai a considérablement augmenté au vu des récents progrès réalisés en matière de technologies de triage et des capacités supérieures par unité. Le tri granulométrique du minerai offre une plus-value intéressante en termes de traitement du minerai à plus faible teneur extrait des mines ; il permet par ailleurs l’acheminement vers le concentrateur de minerai à plus haute teneur et la revalorisation des stériles dans le minerai. On met généralement l’accent sur la susceptibilité du minerai au triage et sur les réductions connexes en termes d’utilisation de l’énergie, de l’eau et de biens consommables. Cependant, l’aménagement physique de l’équipement a une incidence non négligeable sur le coût installé d’une usine de concentration, et les répercussions sur l’aménagement de l’installation d’un circuit de triage du minerai dans l’usine doivent être soigneusement examinées. Cet article étudie les considérations relatives à l’aménagement de l’usine de traitement qui jouent un rôle important dans les projets de triage du minerai, et notamment les exigences supplémentaires en matière de concassage et de criblage, le transport de matériau résiduel jusqu’à la pile de stockage des déchets miniers (nombre de camions requis dans le parc minier) et les effets sur l’empreinte de l’usine de traitement. ¦ MOTS CLÉS aménagement de l’usine, climats froids, triage du mineraiINTRODUCTION Ore sorting has been practised throughout history. An early report by Agricola in 1556 documents how metallic and non-metallic minerals were extracted from rocks by laboriously breaking them with hammers and picks and hand-picking selected material with higher grade (Hoover & Hoover, 1950). The concept has not changed, but sorting technology has evolved significantly over the last 20 years"

Jan 1, 2019

By P. Mattar

The geotechnical importance of studying fluid flow through porous media and soils in particular, becomes evident when dealing with groundwater movement in surficial geomaterials that can be initiated by hydraulic gradients that develop during construction activity, groundwater extraction, impounding of reservoirs and groundwater recharge during adverse climatic events. In a geotechnical context, rocks are regarded as virtually impermeable materials, with comparatively greater resistance to flow of water through their pore structure. The importance of the permeability of rocks comes to the forefront when deep geologic formations are used in geoenvironmental activities for disposal of hazardous and toxic materials. The permeability of the rocks encountered is of critical importance to these geoenvironmental activities since the movement or transport of the hazardous materials during their eventual release will be largely governed by the permeability characteristics of the geologic formation. The estimation of the permeability characteristic of geologic formations is a non-trivial exercise since the measure of permeability can be influenced by the scale at which the measurement is made. Regional-scale and borehole-scale estimates of the permeability can be greatly influenced by the inhomogeneities, including fractures, fissures, solution channels and other anomalies that are present in naturally occurring geologic media. These anomalies are considered to be site specific and can only be determined in a reliable fashion by either conducting tests at the appropriate scale or in the regional-scale through inverse analysis of tracer movement patterns in rock masses. The estimation of the permeability of intact units of a geologic medium has important geoenvironmental applications in connection with storage of wastes since the units in which repositories will be located should be sparsely fractured and the sealing of the fractures and fissures are a prerequisite to developing an efficient solution for storage. The intact permeability of geomaterials is therefore regarded as an important property that influences efficiency and reliability of geoenvironmental solutions for deep geologic disposal. The permeability of geomaterials such as concrete and cementitious grouts are also important to many geoenvironmental and infrastructure applications where durability of structural materials in general and cements used for sealing deep boreholes and other access shafts employed in waste management endeavours is influenced by the permeability characteristics of these materials

May 1, 2009