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By A. C. A. Howe, J. C. Rowntree

"The Bernie Lake pegmatite near Lac Du Bonnet in southern Manitoba is a complexly zoned pegmatite containing several lithium-bearing units in addition to the western world's largest known reserve of cesium. The pegmatite forms a flat-lying ellipsoidal body within an east-west-trending Precambrian amphibolite. The pegmatite enclosed by this vertically schistose amphibolite lies near the eastern tip of a granitic intrusive. The relationship of this intrusive to the pegmatite is obscured by Bernie lake. To date, the pegmatite body has been delineated aver an area of approximately 80 acres; it attains a maximum thickness of 280 feet. Several distinct zones, including three assemblages of economic importance, comprise the pegmatite itself. The combined spodumene and lepidolite assemblages provide a recoverable defined lithium ore reserve of almost 5 million tons averaging more than 2 per cent lithium oxide. The recoverable cesium ore of the pollucite assemblage provides 300,000 tons averaging more than 20 per cent cesium oxide; this represents more than half of the western world's pollucite reserve. The Bernie Lake pegmatite deposit, owned by Chemalloy Minerals Limited, is well located with respect to the growing United States markets, and its reserves of cesium are large enough to enable it, under favourable economic circumstances, to become the major producer of this metal in North America."

Jan 1, 1967

By J. W. Matousek

The heat content of the waste slag from a typical smelting operation methods for estimating the thermodynamic properties of smelting slags, to include: -- heats of formation -- heat capacities (specific heats) -- heat contents -- melting temperatures -- heats of fusion The techniques are illustrated with the analyses of a nickel reverberatory furnace slag from Copper Cliff, an iron-making blast furnace slag, and a "lateritic" slag from a ferronickel operation in Colombia.

Jan 1, 2007

By David J. McDougall

"IntroductionThe production of pig iron, wrought iron bars and castings in Quebec during the 18th and 19th centuries has been so closely identified by historians with the Forges du St. Maurice on the St. Maurice River a few miles north of Trois Rivières (Three Rivers), that one is sometimes left with the impression that it was the only iron works that ever operated in the province. There were however, about twelve others, one of which was so completely re-built that it should probably be considered as a separate entity. All but two were constructed after the midpoint of the 1800s, coinciding with the growing Canadian demand for ""charcoal pig"" for railway car wheels and castings for industry, and about half of them were technically, if not economically, successful. The misconception about the Forges du St. Maurice may have come about either because of its long history of somewhat less than continuous production over a century and a half, or a tendency of Quebec historians to concentrate on events in the French-Canadian rather than the English-Canadian milieu, but whatever the reason, the other Quebec iron work s have been generally ignored. All but one of the Quebec blast furnaces could be described as ""preindustrial"" with capacities ranging between three and ten tons per day, the exception being the Radnor furnace built in 1892 with a maximum production of about 35 tons per day and an alleged capacity of 50 tons per day.Until a railway network was completed in the 1880s, the location of all the Quebec iron works except the Grantham Iron works was dictated by close proximity to adequate ore reserves because horse transport was of little use beyond a ten-mile radius. The other essentials of forest resources (mainly soft woods) for charcoal, limestone for flux and water power, were generally available except within a few miles on either side of the St. Lawrence river. Among the dozen iron works established in Quebec between 1732 and 1880, seven used bog iron ore in charcoal-fired furnaces."

Jan 1, 1983

By K. D. Eng, W. T. Tierney

"During the past century, the development of vehicular transportation has benefitted tremendously from the performance improvement in engines in a situation where low-cost, plentiful fuel supplies were the order of the day. Engine advances were enhanced by and also dictated fuel modification to better adapt the energy source to the power plant.In discussing the several aspects of the change in approach from ""an engine and its fuel to a fuel and its engine"", the authors touch on the following areas:1. Description of an engine concept that provides the needed flexibility in fuel appetite at good efficiency to cope with future requirement s.2. The constraints placed on liquid fuel resource energy utilization efficiency by special engine-required fuel properties and the fuel efficiency of the various engine types available.3. Future vehicle engine fuel sources. This review will put into perspective the problem associated with the net energy available from future fuel sources under extensive research and development at present.4. A brief review of test data to show that fuel-tolerant and fuel-efficient engines are viable and that, in a fuel-resource-limited future, they can be a ""light at the end of the tunnel.""The Texaco Controlled Combustion System (TCCS)The TCCS is a unique means for stratified charge operation of an internal combustion engine in such a manner as to eliminate the requirement for octane or cetane number specification for the fuel. Octane rating is an empirical engine test method that evaluates a gasoline's resistance to spontaneous ignition or ""knock."" Cetane is based on a different engine test, which determines a diesel fuel's ease of spontaneous ignition . High cetane number enhances cold starting and permits high-speed diesel engine operation. As one would expect, the fuels in current use cover a band when the two values, octane and cetane, are plotted against each other."

Jan 1, 1982

By K. E. Prince, S. Burling, R. J. Ring, M. K. Maley, W. R. Taylor

Vanadium occurs as a component of carnotite, which commonly occurs in calcrete type ores, and in association with uranium in some sandstone-hosted deposits. Increasing demand for vanadium, which is used in high-strength steel and Vanadium Redox Flow Batteries (VRFBs), is offering some uranium producers a potential option for by-product vanadium recovery to improve project economics at a time when uranium prices are low. This paper presents the results of recent optimisation studies on the Bigrlyi deposit for the recovery of both uranium and vanadium. The impact of carbonate leaching conditions on uranium and vanadium extraction from a range of carnotite-in-calcrete ores is also examined, with vanadium extraction limited by the proportion of non-carnotite vanadium present in the ores. The findings are particularly relevant to developing projects as results show that elevated vanadium content in ore does not necessarily equate to a high vanadium extraction in leach.

Jan 1, 2020

By T. Hofbauer, M. J. Dry, G. B. Harris, C. W. White

"Urban Mining is a term that is increasingly being used, and represents an appreciable source of secondary materials for the metals extraction industry, a source that does not incur mining costs, but does, at present, incur considerable disposal costs. Electric Arc Furnace Dust (EAFD) is probably the most common of these materials, with an estimated global production of 8 million tonnes annually, of which 1 million tonnes is generated in North America. The contained annual metal value in EAFD at current prices is of the order of $6 billion, yet, apart from the zinc, virtually none of this is recovered.Despite many attempts over the years, with pyrometallurgical, hydrometallurgical or hybrid processes, currently the only commercially viable method of treating these materials is smelting in a Waelz Kiln (or a Rotary Hearth Furnace), which essentially recovers only the zinc, in an impure oxide form, and generates a secondary slag waste, which is still toxic and requires disposal. This paper describes the development of a chloride-based treatment process to recover all components of the EAFD in a marketable form, which centres around the novel hydrochloric acid recovery and recycle operation. Laboratory, miniplant and pilot plant data are presented, leading to the definition of a viable process flowsheet enabling the recovery of pure iron and zinc products (the principal components of EAFD), together with secondary products such as copper, silver, lead, cadmium, magnesium and manganese. A rigorous mass-energy balance is used to examine the preliminary economics involved."

Jan 1, 2014

By K. Chattopadhyay

Fluid flows in metallurgical reactors play a vital role on liquid metal cleanliness for both ferrous and non-ferrous metallurgy. Thus, it is absolutely critical to understand different fluid flow mechanisms, and the use of computational methods to model the complex non-isothermal, turbulent, single- and multiphase-flows, has to be appreciated. The present case study emphasizes on controlling the flow of liquid steel in a tundish and enhancing liquid metal cleanliness. CFD modeling was used to build a robust mathematical model, and effects of flow control furniture and non-isothermal conditions were analyzed. The mathematical model was validated against water model experiments. Parameters that were conducive for inclusion removal were identified and implemented in the plant. Some flow control devices could increase inclusion removal to a great extent compared to the existing configurations. In cases, where a hot ladle was poured into a relatively cooler tundish, inclusion removal was better, whereas results were catastrophic in cases where colder liquid was poured from ladle to the tundish. Similar techniques can be applied for other liquid metals including light metals and non-ferrous metals.

Jan 1, 2015

By Rocky (Yaokun) Wu

Rock burst is one of the biggest challenges to ground control in the mining industry. With increasing mining depth and mining scale, there are more and more industry requirements on yielding rock support. Since 2008, Jennmar has been conducting large scale research and development works to develop a technically reliable and cost effective yielding rock bolt. This paper introduces a new yielding rock support - Yield-Lok bolt. The bolt is characterized by the designed yielding ability to produce 150 ~ 250 mm of deflection at 8 ~ 10 metric tons (Mt) loads for every 16.4kJ energy input. Its performance characteristics are consistent through multiple and varying amplitude of impacts. In this paper, the design criteria of the bolt and the principle of performance are described, the dynamic testing results are discussed; and the features and application of the bolt are presented.

Oct 1, 2010

By M. U. Oko

"Monitoring of all the waste streams from Falconbridge's Sudbury Operations to determine whether they meet the required standards, has been performed for many years. By 1969, however, the number of samples being collected had become so large that a complete revision of the existing systemwas necessary. Sites previously designated by name only, were numbered, clearly marked on the ground and on maps which were circulated to all concerned. The types of pollutants analyzed were determined and specified for each sampling location and a chemical analysis report form was designed. The sampling schedule has been computerized to produce a periodic listing of the samples to be taken and the analyses required.An area map showing sampling sites, chemical analysis report form, spill report and a computer print-out example are shown and explained.EVOLUTION OF FALCONBRIDGE'S WASTEWATER. MANAGMENT SYSTEMFalconbridge Nickel Mines employs some 4500 people, operates nine mines, four mills and a smelter in the Sudbury basin. The operations are geographically fragmented into four widely separated locations, the Falconbridge operations east of Sudbury and the Onaping operations in Levack Township being the two largest of the four. The Lockerby area located to the west and the Lindsley Mine just north of Sudbury are now under development. The magnitude, the diversity and nature of the operations are such that constant vigilance is needed to prevent inadvertent damage to the environment. The purpose of this paper is to describe the information system used to monitor and control waste-water disposal on Falconbridge's properties to help ensure the maintenance of effluent standards satisfactory to the Ontario Water Resources Commission (OWRC) and to the Ontario Department of Health."

Jan 1, 1971

By E. O. Reinbold, J. H. Johnson, D. E. Keski-Hynnila

A field laboratory for use in monitoring underground mine air quality has been developed and proven in underground service. The laboratory includes two separate monitoring systems and data analysis computer programs. One is the Mine Air Monitoring Laboratory (MAML). This is an enclosed trailer-mounted laboratory capable of monitoring CO2, CO, NO, NO2 particulate matter, S02, NH3, temperature and air velocity in the mine drift. The MAML can be up to 1000 feet away from the area being monitored. The second system is the vehicle data system, mounted on the load-haul-dump (LHD) vehicle, which monitors engine speed, engine fuel rack position, exhaust gas temperature, ambient temperature, vehicle speed, CO2 concentration near the operators' breathing zone and the mode of operation of the vehicle. The two computer data analysis programs and the two field instrument systems comprise a complete Mine Air Quality Laboratory (MAQL) for underground pollutant studies. Data from the systems have been used for studying vehicle duty cycles, ventilation systems, exhaust after-treatment devices, vehicle exhaust system design and portable instrumentation. Descriptions of the laboratory are presented along with a summary of some of the experiments performed. The capabilities of the lab are discussed, along with future potential uses.

Jan 1, 1981

By Greg Yuriy

Over the past two decades, Vale Canada has used discrete-event simulation in a key role to support many underground mining studies. Traditionally, general purpose simulation software was developed for manufacturing and service applications. Not until recently have Mine Designers and Simulation Specialists been able to model the dynamics of underground mining scenarios without extensive manipulation of the inherent tools and entities contained within these simulation environments. This paper discusses Vale Canada?s past experiences with a variety of simulation software, describing model development methods and highlighting some of the lessons learned. The paper concludes with a review of recently considered software and provides a framework of desired attributes/functions for modeling mining scenarios.

Aug 1, 2013

By H. H. Bleakney

The merit of reduction-in-area as a criterion of quality in metals is shown to lie in its influence on breaking stress, but the virtue of elongation is not easy to find. In order to assess the value of elongation, either as a measure of quality or as a guide to design, it will be necessary to separate the overall de-formation occurring in tension tests from the localized deformation associated with localized reduction in area. The obstacles to a successful solution of this problem have been shown to be more formidable than is generally appreciated, and a new solution to the problem has been suggested. This solution involves a de-vice by which an electric circuit is broken when the particular value of strain is reached that is to be taken as the point of separation between general and localized deformation. The report presents results from a number of tests on both low-carbon and alloy steels. These results indicate that the selected criterion of separation is accurately identified by the proposed method; that it

Jan 1, 1962

By Trygve Høy

"Important stratabound lead-zinc deposits in southeastern B. C. occur in rocks that range in age from Proterozoic Helikian to Middle Cambrian. The Sullivan deposit, and similar but smaller deposits in the Sullivan area are the only important deposits that occur in clastic rocks with little carbonate content. The highly deformed and metamorphosed Shuswap deposits, of probable Hadrynian to Helikian age, are in mixed marble, calc-silicate gneiss and pelitic schist assemblages, rocks transitional between clastics and carbonates. Deposits in younger rocks, such as the Kootenay Arc deposits in the Lower Cambrian Badshot-Reeves Formation and the Monarch -Kicking Horse deposits in Middle Cambrian dolomite, are hosted by platformal carbonate rocks.An important regional control for the distribution of deposits appears to be a northeast-trending tectonic zone that crosses the Rocky Mountains and the Purcell Mountains just south of the Sullivan area, and projects southwestward toward the Salmo camp at the southern end of the Kootenay Arc. Pronounced northeast-trending gravity and magnetic anomalies, basic volcanism of Hadrynian age (the Irene volcanics west of Creston) and a preferred alignment of Mesozoic granitic rocks indicates that the zone coincides with deep crustal structures. Within the zone are dramatic and abrupt thickness and facies changes in Hadrynian Windermere rocks and lower Paleozoic rocks, and on the east side of the Rocky Mountain Trench in Helikian Purcell Supergroup rocks, indicating that block-faulting was active intermittently within the zone from Helikian through to lower Paleozoic time. Right-lateral and reverse movements occurred on northeast-trending tear faults within the zone in Mesozoic time."

Jan 1, 1982

By David Penswick

Despite anecdotal evidence to the contrary, the mining industry is not in decline. Rather, the world?s largest mining companies are among the most consistently profitable companies in any industry. In many cases, profitable mining companies have been built around a few large scale, long life mines. These criteria for success ? size and long life ? have led to the current preference for deposits that can be exploited using open pit methods. However, developments in the science of block caving have resulted in this mining method achieving costs and productivities that are competitive with the largest open pits, while achieving widespread applicability. One implication of the low costs and widespread applicability of block caving is that some current open pits are possibly too deep.

May 1, 2003

By D. J. Reddish

The paper describes a case study where numerical modelling has been applied to predict potential risks associated with inflows of water in active mine workings from an overlying sandstone aquifer. The objective of the modelling was to predict the development of strata fractures and strains as the longwall panels were extracted and investigate their relationship to an sandstone aquifer. The numerical modelling study also included the investigation of the effect of mining on a fault that existed close to the start position of one of the panels. The potential effects of mining on the fault were undertaken by parametric studies adjusting properties for the fault and the relative position of extractions, which allowed the mine planner to position the panel layout accordingly.

May 1, 2003

By Malcolm Black

Introduction The circumstances under which the gold mining industry was forced to curtail operations a few years ago are well known to all. The effect of those circumstances is particularly noticeable when one enters some of the larger mills that were designed, in better times, to treat relatively large tonnages. On their grinding floors one will observe that a number of grinding units are lying idle, and the ravages of rust are everywhere in evidence. The same applies to other equipment throughout these mills. In 1941, we found it necessary to reduce tonnage considerably in the Wright-Hargreaves mill. With the assumption that a lower tonnage would be of long duration, we began to focus our attention on some of the idle equipment with a view to re-arrangement of the flow-sheet for greater economy of operation. In an article by the writer published in the Engineering and Mining Journal (March, April, and May issues, 1939) , it was pointed out that in designing this mill there was a very limited floor space available. The choice of thickening equipment was imposed solely by the necessity for space: conservation. Thickening by gravity would have required 5,000 square feet of floor space, whereas Genter thickeners required only 1,200 square feet. As a consequence, the Genters were chosen. The decision to add flotation to the circuit was made primarily to save space. On a cost-plus-tail basis, 80 to 100 hours agitation on all pulp would produce similar overall results, but would require much more space.

Jan 1, 1948

By M. Zavvari

Flotation, as with most engineering disciplines, involves testwork. Commonly this means going from lab scale to pilot scale to industrial scale. It is important to conduct tests to identify key parameters and to optimize even at the lab scale. To reduce the number of tests while maximizing the information, it is necessary to use Design of Experiment and Statistical Analysis. In this communication Fractional Factorial Design was used to identify the effect of 7 main factors on barite flotation recovery from jig gravity tailings at the Dorrin Kashan operation. The factors include: pH, collector and depressant dosage, impeller speed (RPM), pulp dilution, particle size and flotation time. By analysis of the output with Minitab software all factors were shown to have an effect. Among the factors, pH and flotation time have an interaction effect but the others have wise effect as an interaction effect and main effect. Finally, reliability tests at pH= 9, RPM= 1000, collector 1 000g/ton, depressant l 750g/ton, particle size 90 µm, flotation time 90 s, pulp dilution 23 % solids, the optimum level of each factor, were done. At the optimum level a barite concentrate with average specific gravity 4.308 g/cm3, average grade 93.72% and average recovery 90.04% was produced from the jig tail.

Jan 1, 2009

By P. Amelunxen

It is well-known that the particle breakage mode that occurs in a semi-autogenous mill is significantly different from that which occurs in a ball mill, enough so to warrant very different lab scale breakage tests and scale-up models. This phenomenon, at the plant scale, leads to changing process constraints depending on the particular properties of the ore. For example, hard or coarse ores might bottleneck the SAG/AG mill throughput, while the ball mills might constrain throughput when milling soft or fine ores. Because the power draw of a ball mill is fairly constant compared to that of a SAG/AG mill, periods of SAG/AG mill bottlenecks lead to increased ball mill circuit specific energy consumption and a finer grinding circuit product size, which together constitute a loss of efficiency of the overall process. Because HPGR circuit throughput is less sensitive to changes in ore hardness, this situation is less common or severe in those circuits. Furthermore, the ball mills are somewhat decoupled from the upstream crushing circuits through the use of surge bins, which also helps to mitigate this effect. As a result, ore hardness variability constitutes a significant cost penalty that should be applied to SAG mill/ball mill/pebble crusher SABC circuits when evaluating the relative economics of different grinding circuit configurations. Nevertheless, the issue is by-and-large ignored, because most current HPGR trade-off studies are based on averaged ore hardness parameters. This paper provides an estimate of the magnitude of this penalty for a typical operation by using Monte Carlo simulation methods and plant data from Freeport-McMoRan?s autogenous, semi-autogenous, and HPGR-based comminution circuits. A case study from an in-house 96K t/d sulphide project is presented to illustrate the concept. It was found that by including variability effects, the trade-off NPV of the HPGR circuit over that of the SAG mill circuit increases to $84 million from negative $33 million, effectively reversing the original decision of selecting a SAG mill circuit for the fixed hardness case.

Jan 1, 2012

By B. Jin

Removal of fluoride and chloride by alkaline washing from direct lead smelting dust which originated from an Ausmelt furnace is reported. The results show that the fluoride removal efficiency increases with an increase of alkaline concentration, alkaline washing temperature and time. The L/S ratio has little effect on fluoride and chloride removal efficiency. A new flow sheet for removal of fluoride and chloride from the dust was successfully proposed according to the results. Fluoride and chloride removal efficiencies are more than 53.68% and 63.18% respectively using the flow sheet under the optimum parameters of temperature 338 K, L/S ratio 3:1 and alkaline washing time of 1.5 h. The contents of fluoride and chloride in the alkaline washing residues can meet the standard of zinc purity as hydrometallurgical materials for zinc processing.

Jan 1, 2014

By J. E. Udd, L. B. Geller

"Mine-shaft wire-rope discard regulations include, among other criteria, a limited amount of permissible loss-of-breaking-strength (LBS). Currently, this parameter is estimated on the basis of non-destrutive-testing (NDT) with electro-magnetic (EM) type instruments. This paper analyses the accuracy with which these estimates have, so far, been obtained in practice.It concludes that while certain types of testers have produced better results than others, the desired accuracy level has not been attained. Also discussed are the putative reasons for this situation, and appropriate actions that the mining industry might wish to take."

Jan 1, 1990