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By A. Wright, P. Lacombe, R. del Villar, D. Hodouin, C. Sepulveda

"The data acquisition from industrial plants is a fundamental step for process modelling in process optimization, process analysis and automatic control.The introduction, some years ago, of modern distributed control and data acquisition systems in concentrators imposes a new approach in designing experimental schemes for data acquisition campaigns and new criteria for the treatment of the obtained discrete information.This paper presents the methodology applied to sample a zinc flotation circuit at Les Mines Selbaie, Joutel, PQ. Values of 85 process variables were obtained form the Distributed Control and Data Acquisition System (Bailey Network 90) and transferred to the DOS environment. Another 11 variables (flowrates and valve positions) were directly sampled using an IBM-PC compatible computer equipped with a data acquisition card and a signal processing circuit.All variables, under the vector form, were processed in the PC-MATLAB environment to either filter or eliminate the non-linear disturbances and noises, producing useful data for model development. The filtering algorithms are also presented.INTRODUCTIONProcess control does not need to be justified. Whether manual or automatic, any processing plant requires some form of control to accomplish its main objectives: a good quality product and a target throughput. Process control of mineral processing plants has steadily evolved from manual control, where the operator skills and/or experience play an important role, to some level of automatic control, usually considered better, as less human subjectivity is involved, at least when actions have to be taken.The design of these control systems requires the knowledge of the dynamics of the process it is deemed to control. Process modelling is therefore an essential step in the assessment and the design of a control strategy. The choice of model will depend on the available resources and manpower."

Jan 1, 1991

By Greg Sheppard, Eduardo Nebot

Australian researchers have developed new technologies aimed at improving safety and productivity at openpit mines. A data acquisition and feedback system for electric rope shovels has been shown to substantially reduce cycle times and decrease excessive machine duty caused by stalls. This data acquisition system was developed by the Cooperative Research Center for Mining Technology and Equipment (CMTE). It has been tested on a P&H 4100A shovel at Coal & Allied’s Hunter Valley operations and a P&H 4100XPB at BHP Billiton Mitsubishi Alliance’s Goonyella Riverside Mine in Central Queensland. In addition, CMTE member P&H Mine Pro Services has used the technology to acquire field data from a P&H 4100XPBrope shovel at RAG’s Belle Ayr Mine in Wyoming’s Powder River Basin.

Jan 1, 2002

By S Versace, D Arnott, D Bojcevs, A Shaw

The George Fisher deposit is a significant sediment hosted silver-leadzinc resource located 2 km north of the Hilton Mine in NW Queensland. The George Fisher feasibility project involved the completion of underground and surface drilling programs to delineate Measured and Indicated Resource which could be converted to an Ore Reserve through mining and commercial studies. The geological information which was collected and used for the feasibility study included a major program of diamond drilling, predominantly from underground sites, but with some drilling also completed from surface. All drillcore was geologically and geotechnically logged, sampled and assayed. Data was also collected from underground cross-cut and drive development which was mapped for rocktype, ore distribution, structure and geotechnical condition. This new geological data, generated during the Pre-Feasibility and Feasibility stages, was combined with results of all previous drilling campaigns in the George Fisher area to produce a comprehensive database on which geological modelling and Resource estimation could be based. To allow fast and accurate collection and utilisation of data from the drilling program, digital collection processes were used where possible. This resulted in rapid data entry into the project database, significantly enhanced data quality, 100 per cent data ownership within the project team and increased productivity levels. Processes used during the project data collection program are described, lessons learned are related and suggestions for ænext timeÆ are listed using the benefit of hindsight.

Jan 1, 1998

By Aaron Samuel Young, Hiago Antunes Amador de Oliveira, William Pratt Rogers

Low commodity prices and lack of new high-grade deposits are pushing the mining industry for innovation. Lean mining has been vastly discussed in the past decades as a way to continuously improve mining efficiency. Although very theoretical, lean mining presents a set of new solutions enabled by the digital transformation that the mining industry is going through. This paper proposes a framework for a short interval control system with the purpose to allow timely responses by front line supervisors upon operational deviations. In the first part, the author briefly reviews concepts of short-range planning and lean mining. Then, the materials and methods used for the development of the short interval control system are discussed. Finally, alpha trial results are presented, and next steps discussed.

Oct 3, 2019

By B L. Dickson, E, M F. Lee, P A. Mikula

Computational techniques are needed to assist in the analysis and interpretation of the increasing amounts of geoscientific and mining related data and information that are routinely gathered at mine sites. New interpretation methods are needed to provide an integrated approach so as to establish relationships (cause and effect) or to be predictive about possible outcomes based on acquired data. Traditional multivariate statistical methods are often confused by variable relationships that are non-linear, data distributions that are non-normal, and by the data themselves that may contain missing values, text and both continuous and discontinuous numeric values. Modern data mining methods are available to understand the relationships within and between diverse data sets, and identify relationships or trends associated with processes, measurements and mine design parameters in mines. The self-organizing map (SOM) is a data mining approach with the advantage that all input data samples are represented as vectors in a data-space defined by the observations (variables). The SOM procedure is an exploratory analysis tool that highlights patterns and relationships. Results are internally derived, in an unsupervised fashion based on measures of vector similarity. Our SOM outputs are highly visual, which assists in understanding and illustrating the dataÆs structure and internal relationships. Two studies are presented. The first uses SOM to investigate the relationships between a range of measured and derived rock property parameters and their observed behaviours during mining. Our aim was to determine whether a SOM analysis would allow a better understanding of observed and predicted rock behaviours from their rock properties. The SOM analysis showed that there were indeed relationships between æbrittleÆ, æsugaryÆ, æslabbyÆ and æsqueezingÆ rock behaviours and a number of the input parameters. The computed SOM æstructureÆ was then used to assess the likely behaviour of unknown samples by assigning them into behavioural fields based on their measured and derived geotechnical responses. The second study was aimed at assessing whether a SOM analysis of microseismic data at the Kalgoorlie Consolidated Gold MineÆs (KCGM) Mt Charlotte mine can contribute towards understanding and potentially forecasting/minimising seismicity at the mine-design stage. The database comprised 40 sample æclustersÆ of microseismic parameters from the MS-RAP software package, which were derived from 2500 individual seismic events. The SOM analysis showed that some of the initial mining conditions are related to the seismic parameters. In each of the studies, the SOM procedures assisted in understanding the data and provided new insights. Because of its æordered vector quantisationÆ foundation, the SOM procedure is a substantial improvement over traditional statistical methods in three main areas:its ability to analyse data from disparate sources, including different data types; its ability to analyse sparse data sets with missing values; and its ability to analyse and visualise non-linear relationships within a data set.

Jan 1, 2006

By S. Dessureault

The relatively recent explosion of available data in all business sectors has induced a common expression of “drowning in data, starving for information.” The mining sector is affected by the information age through equipment-based sensors, process monitoring, and traditional enterprise data sources. Information technologists have developed techniques such as data mining that apply new and old statistical algorithms to large datasets. Mine planners and managers can apply these tools for improved planning and control, thereby increasing the use of the highly underutilized information system infrastructure in most modern mines. This paper describes the use of data mining and its enabling technology, data warehousing, in the development of an energy consumption model for large surface mines using real historical data.

Jan 1, 2007

By Austin Metz, Kevin Stanton, Ramin Motamed

"A recent study calibrated Load and Resistance Factor Design (LRFD) resistance factors for local soil conditions in the Las Vegas Valley. As a part of this calibration, an extensive database of drilled shaft load tests and associated subsurface soil information were collected and compiled. This database, deemed the Nevada Department of Transportation Deep Foundation Load Test Database or NDFLTD, was designed with the presentation of load test data, the subsurface soil conditions, and the spatial distribution of the data in mind. In addition, the NDFLTD was developed in a way that allows additional data to be added as it becomes available. As such, the rules of database normalization were followed to allow for additional and different types of data to be added to the database and reports. Microsoft Access was chosen to present the data because it is easily accessible to anyone with Microsoft office software, it has a quick learning curve, and it has the ability to present a relational database. The largest obstacle faced when creating the NDFLTD was normalizing the data used in the LRFD calibration, with the goal of reaching the 5th normal form.INTRODUCTIONLRFD is based on statistical performance of engineering components, as opposed to the more traditional Allowable Strength Design (ASD), which divides the strength of a component by a safety factor. Calibration of resistance factors for LRFD requires a robust statistical analysis of past performance. For drilled shafts this requires a database of full scale load tests (Abu-Hejleh et al. 2014). The FHWA developed the largest US based deep foundation load test database, deemed the DFLTD, collecting data from 1985 to 2003 when funds ran out (Abu-Hejleh et al. 2014). Recently, the DFLTD has been updated to modern standards (Petek et al. 2016). In October of 2007, the FHWA mandated state department of transportations (DOTs) to follow AAHSTO LRFD guidelines for their highway foundation designs (Abu-Hejleh et al. 2014). Since then multiple state DOTs have developed their own, region specific deep foundation load test databases. Florida has a long history of developing databases for deep foundation LRFD resistance factor calibration, with the two main databases being the FL database, and The Deep Foundations Database (Abu-Hejleh et al. 2014). Iowa developed a Microsoft Access based database in 2014 (Garder et al. 2014). Oregon developed a database compiling pertinent data from the DFLTD, Florida DOT’s Deep Foundation Database, as well as from other databases (Smith et al. 2011). Illinois developed the “International Database” for static and dynamic reliability based calibration (Long et al. 2009). Louisiana developed a database for LRFD Calibration of driven piles in 2009 (Abu-Farsakh et al. 2009). The California Department of Transportation has its own internal foundation database, which is housed within the Foundation Testing Branch archive (Smith et al. 2011). In 2016, the Nevada Department of Transportation (NDOT) presented its own LRFD calibration for the Las Vegas Valley (Stanton et al. 2017), and the NDFLTD was developed as a part of that project (Motamed et al. 2016)."

Jan 1, 2017

By Ken Witherly

Modern airborne EM surveys typically acquire more data than is processed or analyzed at the time of acquisition Suitable additional processing can provide more diagnostic information, thereby allowing for more effective ranking and hopefully, follow-up of outcomes

Apr 1, 2005

By Randall Morris

After years of steadily declining employment and production, the U.S. coal industry is having a moment. In 2016, when Donald Trump was running for U.S. President, he cast a spotlight on coal mining in his campaign speeches, promising to end the “War on Coal.” Fast forward to 2025. On the first day of his second term, President Trump signed the National Energy Emergency Act, which emphasizes domestic energy production as a matter of national security and focuses on incentivizing domestic energy resources. Then on April 8, President Trump issued an executive order opening federal land to coal mining to reinvigorate “America’s beautiful clean coal industry.” As the nation seeks to identify reliable solutions to meet its ever-growing energy needs, the administration is going all in on proven, reliable and readily available natural resources, including coal. This means the coal industry is positioned to play a pivotal role in the administration’s stated energy policy, and highwall mining could be an integral factor in helping the industry optimize the extraction of ore to make the most of this moment. The White House noted in a statement that the United States’ “abundance of energy and natural resources … have historically powered our Nation’s economic prosperity” and vowed to remove regulations that have hindered developing these resources — regulations that resulted in job reductions and higher energy costs for U.S. consumers, while weakening national security. “There has been an increase in electricity prices in the United States of over 30 percent in the past four years,” said Rich Nolan, president and chief executive officer of the National Mining Association (NMA). “This administration wants to focus on that, inflation and on increasing electricity availability to help lower the price over time by incentivizing energy policy. Coal is definitely a high priority for this administration.” Part of the White House’s strategy is to facilitate investment in coal-fired plants. The shift comes at a time when the reliance of coal-powered energy plants has been waning. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, 7.5 GW of electrical capacity from coal-fired plants was retired in 2024, following the retirement of 22.3 GW of electric generating power the two years prior.

Jun 1, 2025

By Deborah A. McCombe

"There are a number of important dates that must be disclosed when a Qualified Person (QP) is preparing a technical report for securities purposes. The dates are discussed in NI43-101 and the Form of the Technical Report, NI43-101F1. •,Effective date of the technical report •,Possible revision date of the report •,Effective date of mineral resources and mineral reserves •,Date of the personal inspection (site visit) •,Signature date of the date report (execution date) •,Date of the certificate of the QP •,Date of the consent of the QP The effective date of the report is basically the cut-off date for the information that is included in the technical report. The effective date should be close to the signature date. If there is too long a period between these dates, the QP runs the risk of new material information becoming available and then the technical report would no longer be current. The effective date is disclosed on the title page of the report and on the signature page. If a technical report needs to be revised to correct problems or disclosure deficiencies identified by the regulators, the QP will normally need to include a revision date on the title page of the report to distinguish the revised version from the original version. In these circumstances, the regulators will request that the original date of the report remain on the title page and the revised date will be below it. When a technical report must be revised, the QP must resign and date the signature page of the report and provide a new certificate and consent."

Jan 1, 2003

By William Gleason

Since 2004, Dave Kanagy has served as the executive director and chief executive officer of SME. In that role, he has worked with 22 SME Presidents, traveling the world to represent the Society. His prestigious one-million-mile status with United Airlines is a testament to these efforts. He has been to six of seven continents while leading the Society on a journey from a struggling association in 2004 to the largest and arguably the most influential professional mining society in the world. In the following pages, some of those past SME Presidents reflect on their time with Kanagy and paint the picture of a visionary leader who was willing to make the hard decisions for the betterment of the Society while remaining open to new ideas and opportunities. One of his first accomplishments as the executive director was to streamline the SME Boad of Directors from 29 members to nine, making it much more effective. With a keen financial sense, he was able to add value while cutting excess to expand the Society in every measure. As the leader of SME, Kanagy helped facilitate much of the Society’s growth and innovation as the world’s largest mining related organization. He has a B.S. degree in industrial education from the University of Maryland, an M.S. degree in technology education from Eastern Illinois University and is a certified association executive by the American Society of Association Executives. Under his leadership, several unique programs were created or advanced, including OneMine.org, the world’s foremost online mining research library. He enhanced legacy programs and increased collaboration with international organizations. Kanagy is the recipient of prestigious awards, including the Colorado Society of Association Executives’ Professional of the Year award and the Mining and Metallurgical Society of America’s Gold Medal award.

Feb 1, 2026

By Douglas Bartley, Robert McClure

This paper discusses the advances in programmable, testable high accuracy electronic detonator technology. The operation and safety of electronic detonator systems are required to meet rigid safety standards and withstand the demanding environment of in-field applications. These requirements are discussed through comments on existing safety requirements in Europe.

Jan 1, 2000

J. A. Mathews,* Syracuse, N. Y. (written discussion?).-It is interesting to note how frequently we hear of some process that is going to revolutionize the tool-steel business. I don't know why it is, but every one seems to have it in for us poor tool-steel men. About 15 years ago, a good-sized plant was built in Syracuse for the manufacture of cast tools of malleable iron. The promoter of the scheme claimed to have a secret, process that had been given to him by a tramp to whom he gave a lift along a dusty road. The widows and orphans invested liberally in the securities of the company without consulting the men established in the machine-tool business in Syracuse. About two years later, when the sheriff's sale occurred, the secret, which was carried on the books of the company as an asset valued at $2,000,000, brought $15 at auction. A little later another concern started on the theory of replacing scrap high-speed steel with new high-speed steel tools made therefrom. All the tool-steel companies have made a practice of purchasing high-speed

Jan 5, 1919

By Thomas C. Anderson

Thirty-four retaining walls are part of the $46 million upgrade of a 1942 depressed highway in Highland Park, Michigan near Detroit. This project will close a missing link between two newer roadways, I-75 and the John Lodge Freeway. The existing 75 ft. wide, six lane Davison Freeway is being replaced by a eight to ten lane, 200 ft. wide depressed highway in a limited right of way. The highway will be 20-25 ft. deep and 1.5 miles long. A design/build decision by the Michigan DOT saved about 37% of the engineers estimated cost of $19 million for the walls. The successful pre-qualified specialty contractor utilized an innovative solution for the walls consisting of tiedback/cantilevered walls on the north side and mechanically stabilized earth walls on the south side. All of the walls have an identical cast-in-place architectural facing.

Jan 1, 1999

By H. V. Scotland III

Lafarge Corporation's Texas Quarry, in Baltimore MD, achieved a substantial expansion of pit reserves by removing an inactive underground mine. The day lighting program, designed, and completed in 1997, open pit mined more than 400 meters of room and pillar workings which were originally developed to recover high brightness Calcium Carbonate. The project proved to be a challenge throughout its course as the pit plan was modified and successful daylighting techniques were developed to remove the mine without adversely affecting the safety of the operation, quality of the stone recovered, or negatively impacting the surrounding community. The design parameters and techniques developed and implemented at Texas may prove of interest to other operators as they are faced with daylighting opportunities. This article will detail the challenges we faced and the solutions which made the project a success.

Jan 1, 1999

By J. W. D. Groenewald, L. Auret, B. S. Lindner, E. C. Nienaber

Mineral processing plants have complicated control strategies, with different control layers, multiple interacting loops, and feedforward disturbance rejection. The complicated control strategies mean that oscillations can arise and propagate to multiple loops and degrade the control performance. Oscillation detection techniques, such as the spectral envelope method, can be applied to detect oscillations within an observation window. However, the start- and end-points of the oscillations within the observation window cannot be identified with current oscillation detection techniques. The start- and end-points would be useful to label the oscillatory intervals, and then to use these labels to identify process conditions associated with the oscillation. In this paper, a pattern recognition technique, Density-Based Spatial Clustering of Applications with Noise (DBSCAN), was used to label oscillation intervals. An oscillation diagnosis workflow combining spectral envelope and DBSCAN was demonstrated on an industrial case study of oscillations in a flotation circuit concentrate sump. The workflow successfully detected the oscillation, labelled the oscillatory intervals, and enabled accurate root cause analysis. The impact of time series features, namely the signal power ratio () and the oscillation frequency, on the performance and optimal parameter selection of DBSCAN was also investigated. Low oscillation frequencies and low s negatively affected the performance of DBSCAN. Additionally, the results indicated that higher oscillation frequency was related to higher optimal values for the lag parameter. Keywords: Oscillation diagnosis, process monitoring, data mining, clustering, flotation control

Jan 1, 2020

De Beers? Finsch diamond mine began operation in the 1960s as a surface project using the latest technology available. During the 1990s, the operation, located about 160 km (100 miles) west of Kimberley, South Africa, began its move as an underground mine. The earlier stages (Blocks 1, 2 and 3) of underground work at Finsch used open stope mining methods, also using the latest in technology. The mine began developing Block 4 in 2004. How-ever, studies on this level showed that block caving was a more efficient mining method than open stoping. It was during those studies that De Beers determined that Block 4 would be a good candidate for testing Sandvik?s automated truck haulage technology.

Jan 1, 2008

By Mauro Chiesa

An Overview on the Presentation A.The Markets ?Mining Industry ?Capital Markets ?A Six-Cell Matrix of Strategic Options B.De-Risking The Mining Assets ?The Value-Added ?The Assets: Current and in Development ?The Feasibility Study C.(Questions, and answers) Post-Crunch: Some Maxims ?Three Metal Market Models No Longer Prevail ?New models are uncharted: ?be prepared?(ref: Lord B-Powell). ?Capital markets are pricey & uncertain: be your own financier first ?focus on value and on cash-flow (not oz, lbs, tonnes, LOMs, etc) ?Know your banker/financier(and it should know mining) ?In the past, it was ?know your borrower? ?It?s a buyer?s market that wants the ?right deal?: so cast a big net: ?Data must be current, concise and consistent ?3rdparty validation of feasibility work is now a ?passport? ?The risk matrix, with de-risking, is as important as the ?math?

May 1, 2011

By C. M. Badeen, J. Paige, W. Evans, L. McCauley, A. Caddies, I. Alilovic, R. Turcotte, C. O. Lyogun, C. Bonner

Gear pumps are very commonly used for the pumping of AN-water based emulsion products for both handling and blast loading applications. The potential major hazardous problems likely to be encountered with these pumps are: (i) high probability of friction; (ii) possibility of product confinement in the area of the bushings; (iii); high bearing failure rate; (iv) pump running dry; (v) presence of foreign material; (vi) deadheading of pump; (vii) delamination of elastomer from steel gears. Of all these possible scenarios, the no-flow situations where the pump is running dry or deadheaded have always been recognized as the most serious ones.

Jan 1, 2015

By O. Leuangthong, M. Nowak

"The impact of high-grade data on resource estimation has been a longstanding topic of interest in the mining industry. Concerns related to possible over-estimation of resources in such cases have led many investigators to develop possible solutions to limit the influence of highgrade data. It is interesting to note that the risk associated with including high-grade data in estimation appears to be one of the most broadly appreciated concepts understood by the general public, and not only professionals in the resource modelling sector. Many consider grade capping or cutting as the primary approach to dealing with high-grade data; however, other methods and potentially better solutions have been proposed for different stages throughout the resource modelling workflow.This paper reviews the various methods that geomodellers have used to mitigate the impact of high-grade data on resource estimation. In particular, the methods are organized into three categories depending on the stage of the estimation workflow when they may be invoked: (1) domain determination; (2) grade capping; and (3) estimation methods and implementation. It will be emphasized in this paper that any treatment of high-grade data should not lead to undue lowering of the estimated grades, and that limiting the influence of high grades by grade capping should be considered as a last resort. A much better approach is related to domain design or invoking a proper estimation methodology. An example data-set from a gold deposit in Ontario, Canada is used to illustrate the impact of controlling high-grade data in each phase of a study. We note that the case study is by no means comprehensive; it is used to illustrate the place of each method and the manner in which it is possible to mitigate the impact of high-grade data at various stages in resource estimation."

Jan 1, 2015