Methods Of Combatting Climatic Problems On Longwall Coalfaces

In the UK as existing face capacity is replaced, many of the new faces will have higher installed powers and be located in zones of higher strata temperature. These factors coupled with the need to increase production will result in more faces experiencing environmental difficulies, especially with respect to climatic conditions. In many cases these problems are unlikely to be solved, as in the past, by simply increasing the face air quantity. Therefore other techniques including refrigeration will be necessary, possibly requiring major capital and operational expenditure. It is easy to spend large capital sums and incur high operational expenditure without achieving the desired amount of climatic control. There is therefore a great need for reliable prediction techniques to aid in the making of sound, informed decisions which will have a significant influence in the long term on the level of production costs. A computer program able to predict the heat flows and resultant climatic conditions on a long¬wall coalfaces has been developed. Throughout it's development underground measurements have been used to validate the computer model and it has been shown that for an advancing coalface under normal production conditions that the program predicts the climate to within 1°C of the measured conditions. This paper outlines a number of methods available to improve climatic conditions on longwall faces. The coalface temperature prediction program is used to quantify the effects of these methods on the climatic conditions for a model coalface and a comparison is given. In conclusion a cool¬ing strategy for longwall faces is outlined.