New Advances in Brown Coal Handling with a New Generation of Bucket Wheel Excavators, Stackers, and Shiftable Belt Conveyors

The brown-coal opencast mines in Germany's Rhineland have to cope with several problems. Predominant are densely populated areas with highly productive farmland, many railroads, highways, and rivers, as well as towns and farm settlements which have to be removed before or during the lifetime of a mine. Also the ground- water table has to be lowered to keep the deep opencast mines dry and stable. These problems urged a development towards deep opencast mines with powerful machines; the large material movement and the high coal production are the basis for the economic success in working the Rhenish brown-coal deposits. Up to now, bucket wheel excavators with a daily capacity of 100,000 m3 (130,000 cu yd) are in operation. Machines of twice this capacity are under construction. Corresponding to the excavators development, the stackers' capacity has to be increased too. The new stackers will reach a daily capacity of 240,000 m3 (310,000 cu yd). The haulage in the mine is performed by conveyor belt systems, which are arranged in such a manner that the belt lines meet at a belt switching point. Here the incoming lines may be connected to the outgoing ones so as to direct the material flow to the desired receiving stations. At the moment there are conveyor belts in operation with a width of 2.2 m (7.2 ft); the new belts will have a layout for 37,000 t/h (40,770 stph), the width of which amounts to 3.0 m (9.8 ft). All belts and driving stations on benches are shiftable.