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This Bureau of Mines report summarizes the research, development, and evaluation demonstrations conducted by the Bureau of Mines under the Health and Safety Act of 1969 to improve the means of notifying miners underground, who are away from their own phone, that they are being called.

Jan 1, 1977

By Frederick T. Fischer

INTRODUCTION Post-Lower Ordovician karstification on a continental scale produced a wide-spread paleoaquifer in the upper portion of the Knox Group of the Southeastern United States. The presence of economic zinc deposits in the Knox of Tennessee is considered to be a con- sequence of this paleoaquifer(1). During The New Jersey Zinc Company's initial exploration of the middle Tennessee region the known artesian nature of modern Knox water and its potentially adverse effect upon mining activities was a matter of concern. This concern intensified as a mining situation appeared imminent and a program of hydrologic investigation was begun in early 1969 and continued through August 1972. The preliminary findings of this work were reported at the AIME World Symposium on Mining and Metallurgy of Lead & Zinc in 1970(2). This paper presents additional data acquired during subsequent stages of the program and relates the hydrologic relationships to the overall geologic framework of the area. PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY The Elmwood mine is 85km east of Nashville and 8km southeast of Carthage in Smith County, Tennessee (Figure 1). Its physiographic location is in the Central Basin of Tennessee, a basin resulting from erosional breaching across the Nashville Dome of the Mississippian strata which now form the bordering Highland Rims. Both the Central Basin and Highland Rims are divisions of the Interior Low- lands Province. Outcropping rock units of the Central Basin are predominantly Middle Ordovician limestones with scattered high hilltops capped by Devonian and Mississippian strata. One outlier

Jan 1, 1977

The state-owned Swedish company LKAB is one of the world's largest producers of iron ore. LKAB mines the greater part of its ore underground, and very high efficiency is vital if it is to compete successfully with open pit mines. Consequently, computers and OR are essential parts of the company's operations. This paper gives some examples of success- ful computer and OR applications at LKAB, coupled with some remarks on the costs and benefits of OR.

Jan 1, 1977

By J. Jay Jacobsen

A dynamic regional coal development model is constructed for the Eastern Powder River Basin of Wyoming. Using this model, alternative development schedules from a recent environmental impact statement submitted to the Department of the Interior are simulated (Ref. 1). These alternatives include different mixes of export capacity, different coal conversion techniques within the region, as well as various levels of coal production. Exportation of 70 to 80 percent of an ultimate coal production of 180 million tons (163.3 x l09 kg) per year and the careful phasing of additional public services with population growth effectively reduce the social and environmental impacts of coal development. The alternative involving the addition of 43,000 megawatts of electrical generation capacity has very significant adverse social and environmental impacts on the region.

Jan 1, 1977

By Robert D. Coale, Reinhart P. Ehrlich, Terry L. Thompson

The copper concentrate slurry pipeline and pumping system of the Bougainville Copper Ltd. facilities on Bougainville Island in Papua New Guinea, is discussed. Development work necessary for the pipeline design is dealt with including a description of the 17-mile by 6-in. pipeline and pumping system as it was installed. The commissioning of the pipeline is reviewed as well as current operating performance, including data on corrosion, pump parts life, and manpower requirements.

Jan 1, 1977

By Thomas L. Kesler

Lithium raw materials usable with present technology consist of pegmatite ore and surficial evaporite brine. Those advantageously located now supply world markets. Materials of similar grades and magnitude, but less favorably located, will come into production as present sources are depleted and markets expand. Some of these potential supplies have been explored, and are reserves in the sense of known availability and quality. Reserves herein are of two classes, those proved by close drilling and assaying, and those of only probable status because their scale and grade are unsystematically indicated. Possible resources include similar materials whose bulk can only be inferred on indirect evidence. All figures apply to total materials in the ground. No allowance is made for losses in mining, evaporation, beneficiation, or chemical processing.

Jan 1, 1977

By Roger A. Harris

INTRODUCTION The Kidd Creek Mine produces a total of 3.6 million tons annually. Geologically the orebody is complex, containing rich values of zinc, copper, silver and lead which are mined and milled as two separate "ore types". Production is mainly from highly mechanized sub-level open stopes of approximately 300,000 tons each. The Mine Engineering Department has developed, and now operates, a computer system that is the subject of this report. It was created specifically to aid the daily work of the mining engineer and has features that are new and possibly unique in the industry. DESIGN OBJECTIVES In 1971 a task force, set up to investigate the subject of computer assistance to mine engineering, specified four design requirements which it felt a successful application had to satisfy. They were:- 1) The computer had to offer a TOTAL SYSTEM that was fully integrated into the routine mine engineering function. 2) The computer had to be directly usable by the current engineering staff, the majority of which had received no formal training in computing.

Jan 1, 1977

By J. B. Hiskey, G. Ramadorai

This paper presents the kinetics of leaching pure wulfenite (PbMoO,) with sodium sulfide solutions. Wulfenite dissolves in the presence of sulfide ion according to the following reaction: PbMoO , + S= PbS + MOO;. Synthetic galena is formed and molybdenum is released to solution as molybdate ion. The reaction follows the shrinking core model and the leaching mechanism involves mixed kinetics where both diffusion and chemical reaction are rate controlling. Molybdenum extraction is explained in terms of temperature, particle size, and sodium sulfide concentration.

Jan 1, 1977

By Larry D. Patts

Section 317(e) of the Federal Coal Mine Health & Safety Act of 1969 directed the Secretary of the Interior to prepare standards under which all working places in a mine shall be illuminated by permissible' lighting while persons are working in such places. Section 317(e) further provides that such Working places shall be illuminated within 18 months after such standards are promulgated. In accordance with this section of the Act, there was published in the Federal Register for December 31,1970 a notice of proposed ru1emaking which prescribed the illumination to be provided in the working p1 aces of underground coal mines. In 1ight of written comments, suggestions, and objections to this proposed ru1emaking, the proposed standards were with-drawn and reproposed in the Federal Register for Wednesday, October 27, 1971. In light of further comments, suggestions, and objections, a public hearing was held on April 4, 1974 and standards were again reproposed and published in the Federal Register for April 1, 1976. Promulgation of the final lighting standards took place on October 1, 1976 which means that the underground coal mining industry must comply with face illumination requirements by April 1, 1978. As mentioned previously, the first proposed ru1emaking for illumination of underground coal mines was published in the Federal Register on October 27, 1971. In early 1972, Consolidation Coal Company (Consol) and the United States Bureau of Mines agreed to a cooperative study of underground face illumination; Conso1 felt that expertise in this field would become increasingly important. Conso1's initial efforts in illumination were aimed at investigati.ng practical lighting systems for underground face equipment. We were concerned with installing unobtrusive lights which provided sufficient face illumination for safety, but at the same time were readily maintainable, electrically reliable, and physically sheltered from damage.

Jan 1, 1977

By James D. Cribbes

The .paper examines some variables which influence the quality of iron ore pellets, and which may be modified to meet the specific requirements of blast furnaces and direct reduction processes. Quality parameters defining pellet physical strength, size structure and reduction behavior considered important by the operators of blast furnaces and direct reduction processes are listed. Laboratory results are used to illustrate how feed preparation, and pellet chemistry car1 be altered to meet these specific quality criteria and some aspects of the economic impact of quality demands on the pelletizing operation are discussed.

Jan 1, 1977

By Leon J. Perrier

The paper describes the equipment in use, haulage grades, road conditions, tire sizes, tire performance and related problems. Various types of failures and causes, corrective action taken, tire records and reporting for control are also discussed.

Jan 1, 1977

By F. P. Agterberg

"IntroductionTHE KNOWLEDGE about the mineral resources in a region ranges from relatively precise ore-reserve estimates for known deposits to probabilistic estimates concerning the speculative resources which may be discovered in future at greater depths and in the less-explored parts of the region. Previously developed probabilistic methods for regional resource evaluation (1) are based on the following two assumptions.(1) The probability that a specific block of rock, or part of a region close to the topographic surface, contains undiscovered deposits can be estimate d by weighting selected geological, geophysical or geochemical parameters for that block. The weights are computed by considering similar environments which are known to contain deposits.(2) Some of the characteristics of the undiscovered deposits, such as ore tonnages and average grades of metals contained in the ore, can be evaluated by considering probability distributions f or known deposit data. These methods were initially applied to Precambrian deposits in the Abitibi Volcanic Belt of the Canadian Shield (1).Since 1972, statistical methods for quantitative resource evaluation have been applied to the occurrences of the mainly Paleozoic base metal deposits in t he Canadian Appalachian Region. The objectives of this project (Project Appalachia) have been discussed by Leech (2) in a paper that introduces 8 papers with results of the exploratory data analysis. Project Appalachia represents an effort to develop and apply methods of combining information and concepts from regional geology, metallogeny and geomathematics for computer- aided regional mineral resource evaluation."

Jan 1, 1977

By V. A. Ettel

Current practices in electrolytic winning and refining of copper , nickel and zinc are reviewed from the point of view of their respective energy requirements. The electrical energy requirements of these processes are broken down in to the individual components, which belong to two basic categories: (a) thermodynamic energy requirements (G of the desired reaction) : (b) energy losses (anode and cathode polarizations, ohmic drops in the electrolyte and in the cell hardware, energy losses due to unwanted side reactions and electrical shorts). The individual energy components are separately examined for each electrolytic process and the potential for energy saving in these processes is discussed. It is shown that many potential energy-saving measures are uneconomical at the present time, as they increase over-all operating costs. The discussion is focused on those approaches which hold most promise for the future.

Jan 1, 1977

By David A. Summers

In May 1975 the U. S. Bureau of Mines contracted with the University of Missouri-Rolla, Rock Mechanics and Explosives Research Center to develop a Hydrominer modification to a long-wall shearer unit, wherein the rotating pick-laced drums and connecting gear drives are replaced by a water jet cutting head.1 The concept of the water jet cutting head is based on using the high localized energy of the water jets to isolate a slice of coal by cutting a slot under, at the back of, and at the top of the web. The plow blade of the head then advances into the cut and wedges the pillar over onto the conveyor (Figure 1). There were several potential advantages foreseen for the system of which perhaps the most significant were the elimination of coal dust from the working area2 and the ability, with a variation in nozzle geometry, to cut webs of greater depth with a small increase in equipment horsepower. The University initially designed the head, based on experiments carried out in the laboratory, under an earlier Bureau of mines contract. The experiments showed that it was more advantageous to work at a pressure of 10,000 psi with an estimated flow rate of 50 gpm than go to the higher pressures and lower flow rates which have been advocated elsewhere.

Jan 1, 1977

By Richard Klimpel

1. Introduction Laboratory and industrial grinding tests have shown that the process of size reduction can be significantly influenced by chemicals added to the powder or slurry being ground. The terms grinding aid or grinding additive refers to a substance which when mixed into the mill contents causes an increase in the rate of size reduction. The increased rate can be used to grind a higher feed rate to the desired product size or it can be used to produce a finer product size at a fixed feed rate. Whether the use of a grinding aid is justified in any given situation depends on the cost of the substance versus the improvement of output or product quality obtained with its use. Obviously, an expensive chemical must be effective in very small concentrations if it is to be economically justifiable; the cost criteria is calculated on the basis of the cost of the grinding additive per ton of material ground. Although there is direct experimental verification of the advantageous effect of grinding additives, no sound scientific explanation has yet been offered which explains or predicts the general behavior of additives. Rose and Sullivan have summarized most of the work undertaken prior to 1950 and Hartley, Prisbrey, and Wick have recently prepared an updated synopsis of the grinding additive literature. Many of the studies reported consist of subjecting materials with simple geometric shapes to some type of hardness or controlled single fracture test. On the other hand, a number of the studies were carried out on operating industrial scale mills, with little control or precise monitoring of the effect of the additives.

Jan 1, 1977

By Z. M. Zavodni, M. K. McCarter

This paper identifies physical conditions responsible for past instability of the Main Hill area in Kennecott Copper Corporation's Bingham Canyon Mine, Bingham Canyon, Utah, and describes successful stabilization techniques employed in this slide zone. Geotechnical highlights of recent slides are presented, including monitoring, geological engineering data collection, hydrology, physical rock properties, and stability analyses. Local conditions responsible for slope movement in the Main Hill zone are: (1) high pore water pressure that causes a substantial decrease in real and effective material strengths; (2) continuous structural systems that allow sliding in the more competent rock zones; and (3) broad areas containing fractured, altered , and incompetent rock and soil- like materials. The failure mode is structurally controlled and involves a circular-type soil failure in the toe region initiated by excessive pore water pressure. A surface mapping method is presented which assigns rock mass quality on the basis of block size and rock substance strength. This site characterization technique has successfully predicted slide boundaries and failure modes; used in conjunction with laboratory determined shear strengths, it has provided basic input for calculating slope safety factors in the Main Hill slide zone.

Jan 1, 1977

By Karl D. Libsch, Modesto E. Erneta

Both battery design and environmental pressures are forcing the secondary lead industry to consider new and different processes. Trends in battery design are making normal decasing increasingly difficult. Lead in air, sulfur dioxides, and solid/liquid waste heavy metal restrictions are tightening. There is no clearly defined industry trend toward a given process, but it is clear that plants will be larger, less labor-intensive, and automated.

Jan 1, 1977

By L. P. Johnson

Longwall mining has gained acceptance as a safe method of maintaining coal production where conventional systems were unsuccessful or uneconomic due to bad roof conditions (Kuti8). One of the major problems confronting American operators involves the correct choice of equipment which should be selected to suit the local mining and geologic conditions for optimum productivity. To achieve this, factors such as rock strengths, local geology, panel geometry, and panel orientation must be examined to optimize production and minimize down time due to ground control problems. Little quantitative information is available in the literature regarding the effects of geologic conditions on American longwall operations, and past implementations of longwall systems appear to have been based largely on experience. When mining engineers are able to assess the geologic conditions both quantitatively and qualitatively, they can more fully optimize equipment selection and panel design.

Jan 1, 1977

By R. D. Brown

Ever since British Columbia started the ball rolling in 1974 with the introduction of its now-defunct Mineral Royalties Act, all Canada's resource-based provinces have significantly altered their mining tax systems. The last resource-based province to abandon its pre -1974 mining tax structure is New Brunswick, which introduced a new mining tax regime in the summer of 1977 to take effect from April 1 1977. The new structure, which represents the outcome of considerable study and discussions with industry representatives, contains some intriguing concepts which make Nero Brunswick's new mining tax system unique among the Canadian provinces.

Jan 1, 1977

By Kenneth R. Krivanek

In recent years the widespread problems of air and water pollution generated by both population and industrial expansion have become a major public concern. Therefore, many municipalities are striving to achieve more efficient wastewater treatment processes so these wastewater's can be reintroduced into the waterways of our nation with little or no detrimental effects on the future beneficial use of that water. With this, improved treatment comes an ever increasing volume of wastewater sludge which must be disposed of in a manner of minimal impact on the environment. Furthermore, with demand for energy continually accelerating in this nation, our concern over high oil prices and our increasing dependency on foreign oil sources, there has been an ever growing interest in the largest energy source that are nation has, coal. However, surface mining of coal can cause many environmental problems when adequate precautions are not faithfully adhered to. These problems include water pollution from silt and/or clay erosion and acid runoff, produced by oxidation and hydrolysis of pyrite; i.e., FeS2 + 3/02 + H20 + FeSO4 + H2SO4. One method of wastewater sludge disposal which can utilize large volumes of sludge for a beneficial project that may not compound our environmental problems is spray irrigation, to either depleted farmland or to abandoned strip-mined soils. Sludge is characteristically high in organics, as well as having near neutral to alkaline pH properties. With these two qualities it possesses a potential for neutralizing acid strip mine spoils, which would enhance the establishment of a vegetative ground cover. Sludge can accomplish this by lowering the oxidation potential, reducing the solubility of iron and aluminum and by the chelation of metals, thereby

Jan 1, 1977