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By W. A. Ahrens, J. H. McNamara, J. G. Franek

"An economical, pollution-free process has been developed for the hydrometallurgical extraction of copper from sulphide ores. The extracted copper, in the form of cuprous chloride (CuC/), is converted by reduction to copper metal. The metal is melted and fire -refined into wire bars which meet the standards of electrolytic tough pitch (ETP) copper wirebars. IntroductionThe successful development of the Cyprus Copper Process has been an evolutionary series of events covering a time span of some nine years. The original process, based on an electrolytic membrane cell principle , was abandoned in 1975 because of technical, economic and pollution problems. During the past four years, the pilot plant has been reconstructed based on a new flowsheet and operated successfully in several campaigns, some for as long as four months. The pilot-plant hydro section operates at a 225-lblhr copper rate. In October 1977, a feasibility study was completed by Jacobs Engineering, Pasadena, California. The study showed favourable economic and technical feasibility. Jacob's studies in 1978-79 revealed favourable comparative economics with other known pyrohydro processes and favourable economies of scale.The Cyprus Copper Process converts copper concentrates of varying composition into copper metal, which has been proven to be equivalent in every way to electrolytic tough pitch copper, suitable for electrical applications. This is accomplished at capital and operating costs which are estimated to be lower than those associated with any other known currently applicable technology. Also, the total energy requirement is equal to or less than any other known process and the process is essentially pollution free."

Jan 1, 1980

By W G. Brese

The attention of the world is being focused on the spectacular rise of elemental sulphur production in Alberta. In the short space of a decade, production has increased from less than 10,000 long tons, in 1952, to al-most 1,000,000 long tons in 1962. Moreover, 1963 sulphur production is expected to rise by 50 per cent to approximately 1,500,000 long tons, and further increases are forecast for ensuing years. The reason for this dramatic in-crease in elemental sulphur production, particularly in the last year or two, is that Alberta elemental sulphur is recovered in association with the production of sour natural gas. When very large volumes of natural gas began moving to U.S. markets in the latter part of 1961, the resultant increase in sour gas production led to a marked increase in the production of sulphur. Consequently, Canada, mainly on the strength of sulphur produced in Alberta, will soon become the second largest producer of sulphur in the Free World

Jan 1, 1963

By M. Rafieazad, P. Fathi, M. Mohammadi, A. M. Nasiri

This study examines the impact of low-temperature heat-treatment cycles on microstructure and corrosion performance of Direct Metal Laser Sintered (DMLS) AlSi10Mg_200C alloy. It is known that the morphology and the size of eutectic silicon are the two most critical factors affecting mechanical properties of the AlSi10Mg alloy. Although high-temperature heat-treatment cycles are common practice for the strengthening of the cast Al-Si-Mg alloys, in the case of DMLS fabricated AlSi10Mg alloy, high-temperature solutionizing and low temperature annealing cycles result in mechanical properties degradation primarily due to a dramatic decrease in the solubility of Si in the super-saturated a-Al matrix of the as-printed alloy. In this study, low-temperature heat-treatment cycles that only promote precipitation of Mg2Si accompanied by the interruption of the silicon network were investigated. SEM and XRD analysis were utilized to observe the evolution of microstructure after different annealing heat-treatments at 200, 250, 300, and 350°C for 3 h. Increasing the heat-treatment temperature contributed to the Si networks interruption and an increased precipitation of Mg2Si phase. Low-temperature annealing from 200 to 350°C was found to promote the homogeneity of the microstructure characterized by a uniform distribution of eutectic Si in ??-Al matrix. Additionally, in order to investigate the impact of different heat-treatment cycles on corrosion resistivity of DMLS-AlSi10Mg_200C, the potentiodynamic polarization testing and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy were performed in a 3.5 wt.% NaCl solution. The results revealed more uniformly distributed pitting attack on the corroded surface by further increase in the annealing temperature, which was attributed to the uniformity of Si dispersion. In comparison, low temperature annealing at 200°C led to a penetrating selective corrosion attack along the melt pool boundaries, resulting in a higher corrosion rate associated with the lower absolute value of impedance of the protective passive film on the surface.

Jan 1, 2018

By Paul Guliov

Coal-bearing Tertiary sediments of the Ravenscrag Formation in southern Saskatchewan host numerous deposits of clinker resulting from in situ coal combustion. Clinker deposits form when sediments of relatively low temperature firing properties overlie coal seams which are undergoing prolonged spontaneous combustion. The resulting fired material is useful for decorative landscaping aggregate, rock gardens, driveways, mud control and others. Predicting the occurrence of clinker deposits requires a knowledge of the spatial distribution of coal seams and the nature ofoverlying sediments. Knowledge ofpaleotopography at the time of coal combustion can assist in locating more highly-fused material which can yield greater block sizes. Coal data bases can be used as a predictive tool by outlining areas where coal is or was at or near surface and therefore may have been susceptible to spontaneous combustion.

Jan 1, 2001

By S. McCalpine, W. Muir, P. J. Downey

"Golden Bear Operating Company Ltd. (GBOC) was a joint venture between Chevron Minerals Ltd. and North American Metals Corp. that was formed for the development of the Golden Bear Project. The mine is located at Muddy Lake, Western British Columbia, approximately 80 km northwest of Telegraph Creek and 135 km west of Dease Lake (see Figure 1). Road access to the mine was developed by Golden Bear and consists of a radio controlled 155 km gravel road originating at highway 114.A feasibility study was completed in 1987 and project approval was finalized in 1988 with Golden Bear issuing a ""Request For Proposal"" for detailed engineering in May 1988. Golden Bear also commenced negotiating with vendors at this time for the supply of the two principal process equipment packages: the dry grinding and classification system and the whole ore roaster package.Process plant engineering and plant construction was completed in October 1989 with plant startup commencing in November 1989. Two months into the commissioning phase it became apparent that the plant, as designed, would not achieve the anticipated production targets.Kilborn Engineering Pacific were subsequently contracted by GBOC to review and modify the plant design, assist the operating personnel with plant commissioning and startup and provide operator training.This Paper describes some of the problems encountered during the startup and the plant modifications incorporated to achieve design parameters."

Jan 1, 1992

By J. R. Kadambi, E. Kucukal, J. Furlan

"Hydrocyclones are used in various industrial applications, including mineral processing and tailings management, to separate or classify solid particles and/or liquid droplets from multiphase feed. The fluid flow in a hydrocyclone (used in mineral processing) was investigated numerically and experimentally using particle-image velocimetry (PIV) and refractive index matching techniques. Two turbulence models were used in the calculations: the k–? model and the Reynolds stress model. Particle image velocimetry measurements were taken at various spatial locations along the cyclone. Computational results were validated globally using pressure and flow-rate readings at the boundaries, and locally by comparing the PIV velocity-vector maps and profiles.RÉSUMÉ On utilise les hydrocyclones dans diverses applications industrielles, dont la minéralurgie et la gestion des résidus, pour séparer les particules solides et/ou les gouttelettes liquides de l’alimentation polyphasée, ou pour les classifier. Une étude numérique et expérimentale sur l’écoulement des fluides dans un hydrocyclone (dont on se sert en minéralurgie) a été menée à l’aide des techniques de vélocimétrie par images de particules (PIV, de l’anglais particle image velocimetry) et d’appariement des indices de réfraction. Deux modèles de turbulence ont été utilisés dans ces calculs, à savoir le modèle de turbulence k–? et le modèle aux tensions de Reynolds (RSM, de l’anglais Reynolds stress model). La valeur de la PIV a été mesurée à diverses positions spatiales le long du cyclone. Les résultats de ces calculs ont été validés globalement à l’aide de relevés des pressions et du coefficient d’écoulement d’une extrémité à l’autre de l’hydrocyclone, et localement à des coordonnées spatiales spécifiques en comparant les cartes et les profils du vecteur vitesse PIV."

Jan 1, 2017

By Eric Low

Raising capital by issuing debt or equity is necessary in almost every corporation. In the field of corporate finance, the raising of capital is a heavily-studied topic. However, some of what is studied on this topic in corporate finance is not applicable in the mining industry. There are also many financing options that were created for the mining industry such as flow-through shares, prepaid forwards, and royalty sales. The cyclical nature of the industry makes the risk-return profile of financings more difficult to estimate than in other industries. Additionally, the methods used to assess firm value are different than other industries, as the values of orebodies are not included on balance sheets. For precious metals companies, which are a hedge against most other securities, there are additional complications with determining investor expectations and cost of equity. This thesis puts forth a decision-making framework to explain mine financing choices from the perspective of mining companies. The approach is threefold. First, all of the major equity and debt financing instruments available to mining companies are presented and analyzed. Each financing method is assessed on a wide range of criteria. Next, these concepts are applied in case studies of four companies: BHP Billiton, Barrick Gold, Teck Resources, and Noront Resources. For each company, the overall choice of financing methods is shown and analyzed. The effect of financing choices on the weighted average cost of capital (WACC) is calculated. The final section deals with case studies of individual mine finance decisions during the past two years.

May 1, 2011

By P. Archer

The Blondeau Formation has been examined in a stratigraphic drill section at Barlow Lake. The formation contains pyroclastic flows and volcanogenic sediments throughout, but epiclastic sedimentary rocks dominate the upper parts of the section. Five distinct types of pyroclas tic flows are known in the section, as well as minor mafic lava flows. Volcanogenic sediments are commonly intercalated with the true volcanic rocks. Sedimentary rocks include fine-grained intraclastic sandstones, heterolithic sandstones and green and black shales. Interpretation of the origin and relative disposition of the volcanic and sedimentary rocks favours a model of near-emergent vulcanism in an upward shoaling environment.

Jan 1, 1984

By H. Q. Fan

Construction equipment is an important type of resources of heavy construction contractors. Since equipment breakdowns can cause project delays and significant financial losses, the contractors are eager to know those factors causing equipment failures directly or indirectly, related to equipment design, maintenance, and operations. Although Bayesian network can be used for diagnostic analysis of failure events or making predictive analysis, building a Bayesian network for such purpose can be difficult as the cause-effect relations can be subjective and their conditional probabilities change with a wide variety of causal factors. A hybrid approach is proposed in this paper to update the Bayesian diagnostic network structures and parameters using real life data, the conditional probabilities and cause-effect relationships can be dynamically updated with observed failure records to reflect the real life situations of a complex equipment system. A case study is conducted to show the benefits of the hybrid approach in construction equipment diagnostic analysis.

Aug 1, 2013

By J. Bélanger, B. Semlali, M. Grenon

RÉSUMÉ La conception des fosses ainsi que l'évaluation des ressources géologiques et des réserves minières sont désormais réalisées entièrement à l'aide d'outils informatiques spécialisés. Cependant, plusieurs analyses, pourtant essentielles à l'évaluation de la viabilité du projet, sont réalisées en parallèle sans véritable optimisation ni synergie avec l'ensemble des données disponibles. Cet article présente deux approches permettant d'intégrer certains types d'analyses aux modèles de blocs miniers. Ces approches permettent de quantifier la broyabilité du massif rocheux ainsi que d'étudier la stabilité des pentes minières à même les outils d'optimisation et de planification minières. Cette méthode permet dès l'étude de faisabilité d'un projet minier de maximiser les données disponibles, menant ainsi à une approche plus intégrée en conception minière. De plus, ces approches sont flexibles et permettent d'évaluer rapidement plusieurs scénarios, tout en laissant la possibilité de bonifier le modèle et de revoir la conception tout au long du projet minier.

Jan 1, 2010

By Fathi Habashi

Poland has a unique copper industry. Copper sulphide concentrates are smelted in six shaft furnaces to produce matte and in a flash furnace directly to blister copper. Anodic slimes from electrorefining are treated by a modern technology to recover the precious metals. INTRODUCTION Poland's copper industry began in 1950 when the old and relatively small mines Lena and Konrad, located in Lower Silesia, were drained and recommenced production. In 1957 the industry entered a period of rapid development with the discovery of a rich ore body in the vicinity of Lubin and Polkowice which was the basis for the establishment, in 1961, of the Copper Mining and Smelting Combine (KGHM). In 1991 the Combine was restructured into a state-owned, joint-stock company under the new name of KGHM ?Polska Miedz? (KGHM ?Polish Copper?). It consists of three mines, three smelting and refining plants, and one rolling mill, and produces about 4% of the world?s copper and about 7% of the world?s silver.

May 1, 2001

By V. Sheikhzadeh, M. Saghaeian, R. Hejazi, P. Ghobadi

Design and selection of equipment for a grinding circuit strongly depends on the mill function, ore properties and requirements of the down-stream circuit. Primary mills usually work in open circuit and size distribution of product would be controlled in the final steps using a classifier like cyclone. Although HPGRs are mostly utilized as pre-grinding mills, it is preferred to utilize them in a closed circuit due to their specific mechanism of comminution. Unique mechanical design of HPGR and its completely different crushing process than tumbling mills needs precise consideration on its circuit design. In this paper, we investigate the impact of different parameters on design of pre-grinding HPGR circuit and selection of the proper classifier. Our study focuses on iron ore properties (e.g. moisture, particle size distribution of feed and product, compatibility and de-agglomerability). We also investigated various options of HPGR circuit according the classifier efficiency and influences on down-stream processes. The optimum operating parameters of HPGR (working pressure, speed and level of hopper) for the selected circuit were also determined based on pilot and industrial data. Our pilot and industrial tests and observations revealed that HPGR should be arranged in closed circuit because of the edge effect, as a negative factor of non-uniform distribution of pressure force along the roller width and presence of non-crushed particles in the mill product. Wet vibratory screen could be the optimum option for screening of its discharge. Fine part of the wet screen discharge could be delivered to the concentration stage without over-grinding in ball mill using a hydrocyclone working in a reverse closed circuit mode. Moreover, our pilot and industrial tests during design and operation of ten HPGRs in various iron ore processing plants proved that higher pressure and lower roller speed in a fixed level of material inside the hopper could give the desired product size distribution.

Jan 1, 2016

By C. T. Wiliams, John B. Bush, John Lamb

"THE TOWN OF HEDLEY is in the valley of the Similkameen River, about 200 miles east of Vancouver and 25 miles north of the International Boundary between British Columbia and the State of Washington. The main ore deposits are located on Nickel Plate Mountain, northeast of the town.The outcrop of the Nickel Plate system of orebodies is at an elevation of 5,900 feet. It was discovered in 1898 by prospectors and sold in the following year to the Marcus Daly interests of Butte, Montana. Production commenced in 1904 under the name of Daly Reduction Company. In 1909 control passed into the hands of the Hedley Gold Mining Company. Operation of the mine continued until 1930, when exhaustion of known ore reserves forced it to close. Upon the recommendation of Paul Billingsley (3) the mine was optioned by the 1. W. Mercer Exploration Company in 1932. Production began once more in 1934 under the name of Kelowna Exploration Company Limited, and was practically continuous until August 1955, when the mine was again shut down. The name of the latter company was changed in 1951 to Kelowna Mines Hedley Limited.The Mascot Fraction, a small wedge-shaped claim lying astride the Nickel Plate orebodies, was mined by Hedley Mascot Gold Mines Limited between 1935 and 1949. The geological setting and structural control of ore are essentially the same as in the adjoining Nickel Plate Mine.Total production from all operations on Nickel Plate Mountain to the end of 1954 was approximately 3,800,000 tons of gold ore, with a gross value in excess of $48,000,000.General GeologyNickel Plate Mountain occupies the gentle westerly dipping limb of an asymmetrical anticline, the axis of which trends northeasterly. The rocks are composed of a thick pile of Triassic limestone, limy argillite, and quartzite, -resting on a flattish floor of granodiorite near the base of the mountain. Associated with these sediments is a host of porphyritic sills and dykes of gabbro-diorite composition. In the mine area east-west brown soda-rhyolite dykes and north-south black andesite dykes crosscut all the other formations and the ore, probably following steep later fractures."

Jan 1, 1949

By R. Pressacco

"IntroductionAgrium’s history in fertilizer production and marketing goes back to 1931. Today, Agrium Inc. is a world leader in the production, distribution, and marketing of fertilizers and related products to the agricultural industry. Agrium is the largest North American producer of nitrogen fertilizers, a major producer of phosphate and potash fertilizers, and a world leader in fertilizer wholesale distribution and retail marketing. The mine at Kapuskasing is located some 40 km southwest of Kapuskasing, Ontario (Fig. 1). It has been developed to supply high-quality, low-cost phosphate rock to the company’s Redwater, Alberta facility, where it is an ingredient in ammonium phosphate fertilizer production. The Kapuskasing mine is the only phosphate mine in Canada and will rank as one of the highest-grade phosphate mines in the world (Clark and Duncan, 1999). Apatite is the principal ore mineral mined at the Kapuskasing Phosphate Operations.GeologyThe first record of exploration in the area was from a program executed by Continental Copper Mines in 1955 which evaluated the magnetic anomaly located in the Cargill and Cumming townships for its base metal potential. Intermittent exploration of the base metal potential of this magnetic anomaly continued in the following years, until the phosphate potential of the area was first examined in 1974 by International Minerals Corporation which recognized the presence of a layer of apatite sands overlying the carbonatite host rocks.The local geology consists of a core complex of multi-phased carbonatite rocks which are surrounded by a ring of pyroxenite, and have provided a U-Pb age date of 1907 Ma ± 4 (Sage, 1988). These two rock types are in turn situated within quartz diorite gneisses that form a large portion of the Kapuskasing Structural Zone (Fig. 2). The carbonatite host rock is sub-divided into two sub-types: sovite and rauhaugite. The sovite is a medium- to coarse-grained, white, banded rock in which calcite is the dominant carbonate species and it includes accessory minerals such as phlogopite, magnetite, clinohumite, apatite, olivine, pyrrhotite, and amphibole. Apatite can reach 15% abundance in this rock type (Sage, 1988). In sharp contrast to the sovite, the rauhaugite appears as a massive, fine-grained, dense, beige to tan-coloured rock in which dolomite is the dominant carbonate species. Phosphate values can range to 14% P2O5 in the rauhaugite."

Jan 1, 2001

By William H. White

"AbstractThe value of anomalous metal contents of trees as an aid to the discovery of mineral deposits was tested under field conditions cm four known ore deposits. Results indicate that a base-metal deposit, or any deposit containing zinc or copper, casts a 'metal shadow' into the overlying soil which remains approximately positioned above the deposit, regardless of the type of overburden or the movement of groundwater.The unusually high content of zinc or copper in trees growing within the limits of this 'metal shadow' constitutes an anomaly which can be detected and ,plotted in the field The field kit and certain points of the field technique are described briefly; and the characteristics of plant anomalies and possible limitations of their use are mentioned.IntroductionRecent investigations concerning the metal content of trees indicate not only wide variations in the metal content of different species and in different parts of the same tree but, in addition, suggest that the metal content of a tree is related to that of the subjacent bed-rock. Abnormal values found by Warren, Delavault, and others in trees growing above or near orebodies suggest a new tool which may prove of considerable value in exploration work. Evaluation of this new tool must involve consideration of the following questions:(I) Is the technique one which can be used under field conditions by persons not specially trained; and can results be duplicated within reasonable limits of error? Rather than taking tree samples for subsequent laboratory analysis, it is highly desirable that analyses be made on the spot. This allows anomalous results to be checked and additional samples may be taken at key points."

Jan 1, 1950

By H. R. Stoger

"In 1994 world trade grew by 9%, the fastest annual increase since 1976. Dry cargo shipping rates are at an all time high.Panamax size bulk carriers are receiving19 000 US dollars per day for trans Atlantic round trip voyages. This is good news for the ship owners but not such good news for the industrial users of ocean shipping.The main emphasis of this paper will be on bulk carriers, the charter market and what industrial companies can do to reduce their costs of ocean transportation which is critical to Canadian exporters. Let us look at the charter market in general.Bulk carriers come in four main sizes:1.The Capesize bulk carriers of 110 000 to160 000 tons that are primarily used to transport iron ore and coal;2.the Panamax bulk carriers of about 70 000tons dwt. This is the largest size (with a beam of 105 ft) that can transit the Panama Canal.3.the Handymax bulk carriers of 40/45 000tons dwt; and4.the Handysize bulk carriers of 20/35 000tons dwt.The handysize vessels are usually craned or geared and carry a variety of bulk cargoes including steel. Ship sizes have increased over the years and the mining industry now uses primarily capesize or Panamax bulk carriers.International chartering is conducted through an international network of shipbrokers. There is usually one broker representing the ship owner and another broker who represents the charterer. The major chartering centers are London and New York but a great deal of chartering activity is conducted in regional markets such as Hongkong, Oslo, Montreal and Hamburg.The Biffex Index or Baltic Freight Index is a good measure of dry bulk freight rates. The Biffex is composed of ten major routes. In May1995, the Biffex was at 2310 points. A year earlier it was at 1354, an increase of about 56%."

Jan 1, 1996

By F. J. Hrach, K. P. Flynn, P. J. Miranda

"ST Equipment & Technology, LLC (STET) has developed a processing system based on tribo-electrostatic belt separation that provides the mineral processing industry a means to beneficiate fine materials with an entirely dry technology. In contrast to other electrostatic separation processes that are typically limited to particles greater than 75 µm in size, the triboelectric belt separator is ideally suited for separation of very fine (<1 µm) to moderately coarse (300 µm) particles with very high throughput. The high efficiency multi-stage separation through internal charging/recharging and recycle results in far superior separations that can be achieved with a conventional single-stage free-fall tribo-electrostatic separator. The triboelectric belt separator technology has been used to separate a wide range of materials including mixtures of glassy aluminosilicates/carbon, calcite/quartz, talc/magnesite, and barite/quartz. Separation results are presented for selected industrial mineral sources. An economic comparison of using the tribo-electrostatic belt separation versus conventional flotation for barite / quartz separation illustrates the advantages of dry processing for minerals.INTRODUCTIONThe lack of access to fresh water is becoming a major factor affecting the feasibility of mining projects around the world. According to Hubert Fleming, former global director for Hatch Water, “Of all the mining projects in the world that have either been stopped or slowed down over the past year, it has been, in almost 100% of the cases, a result of water, either directly or indirectly” (Blin et al., 2013). Dry mineral processing methods offer a solution to this looming problem."

Jan 1, 2016

By Eduardo R. Rodrigues, Ankur Narang, Roberto Federico Ausas, U. T. Mello, Jose Maria Segura Serra, M. R. Lakshmikantha, Ignacio Carol, Kamal C. Das

"Modeling of big faults or weak planes of strong and weak discontinuities is of major importance to assess the Geomechanical behaviour of mining/civil tunnel, reservoirs etc. For modelling fractures in Geomechanics, prior art has been limited to Interface Elements which suffer from numerical instability and where faults are required to be aligned with element edges. In this paper, we consider comparative study on finite elements for capturing strong discontinuities by means of elemental (EFEM) and nodal enrichments (XFEM) for Geomechanical applications. For general fracture scenarios, Oliver et al. (2008) have demonstrated advantages of EFEM over XFEM for including: (a) ease of modeling in any standard finite element code due to the possibility of static condensation, (b) higher accuracy in some cases for coarse meshes, and, (c) a reduced computational cost. However, there has been no work that considers cohesive fractures in Geomechanics. We present a numerical analysis based on a linear constitutive model and linear triangular elements for the bulk and a linear constitutive behaviour for the fault for a representative set of fault planes in a circular tunnel made in rock mass. In the numerical examples we consider both well-traced and bad-traced meshes. We focus on traction profile analysis for both EFEM and XFEM, since that is crucial to understand the cohesive fracture behaviour specially rock joint. Therefore in each case, shear, normal and stress ratio are compared across the two methods along the fault plane. This is the first such work that compares XFEM and EFEM behaviour for Geomechanics problems.For the considered class of problems and the sharp penalization approach without regularizations adopted, it can be observed that accuracy and robustness of EFEM may strongly depend on the fault orientation with respect to the element edges, while, XFEM is independent of fault alignment with element edges. It has been also observed that, with mesh refinement model, stress oscillation completely removed with XFEM however EFEM fails to provide oscillation free results with finer mesh in case bad-traced model. We also performed error analysis and found that in case of bad-traced mesh the average error in the XFEM is 84% smaller than of EFEM and for XFEM the error goes to zero with increasing mesh resolution, while for EFEM the error increases with mesh resolution. Thus, we experimentally demonstrate that, XFEM performs better than EFEM in terms of accuracy and rate of convergence with marginal increase in computational cost. This work hence provides novel insights on the application of XFEM and EFEM in Geomechanics."

Jan 1, 2015

By Marcel Vallée

Frequently, costs overruns and defaults in mining project performance result in serious problems and headaches for all project participants and impact on corporate objectives, profits and image and, occasionally, lead to project failure. As mining professional s, we should be very concerned that, in a recent World Bank paper (Weber-Fahr, 2001), geological and technical risks were considered the most important ones facing mining projects. Whenever we manage to reduce or minimize these risks, we are in better position to overcome the environment-, market-, finance- and community-related ones. The causes of this situation seem rather systemic, as a fairly long list of industry problems with new pro jects has been described in industry papers in pas t and recent years. A brief review of industry problems with mining projects will be given first, followed by a review of the basics of the current Quality Management and Continuous Improvement perspectives that have evolved from earlier quality control and quality assurance systems and policies. Particular particular attention will be given to the work of W. E. Deming. As the system approach is an essential part of such policies, it will be described succinctly. Given that poor communications and interactions among geologists, mineral processors and mining engineers/operators ca n seriously affect project efficiency and profitability, these interrelated processes with in the mining systems will be analyzed and modelled and the impacts of such situations will be described through a number of anonymous case histories and examples. A synthesis of Dr Deming&apos;s management system, includ ing his Four teen P oints and System of Profound Knowledge, will be prese nted .

May 1, 2002

By M. E. Holter

"Five main lignite seams occur in the Tertiary Ravenscrag Formation in the Eastevan area, at depths of 100 feet or less. They are named, in ascending order: the Boundary, Estevan, Souris, Roche Percee and Short Creek seams. A total sequence of approximately 250 feet is represented by the coal beds and interstratified clays, silts and sands. Strata dip to the southeast at 25 feet per mile or less and trike northeast. Large areas underlain by coal seams at shallow depths are delineated. Reserve calculations are dependent on detailed information on seam thicknesses and feasible stripmining depths. The stratigraphically higher seams are thinner on the average than lower seams and this, together with the increase in elastic size fractions in higher strata, suggests a retreat of a Tertiary marine margin to the south during the closing depositional history of coal seams and associated strata."

Jan 1, 1972