Search Documents

This paper intends to give an insight into what is often considered to be a poor relation of the mining industry but is in fact an integral part of any community. Aggregate production accounts for more than half of the world production of minerals by weight. In New Zealand production of aggregates runs at around five tonnes per capita per year, making it a significant industry. The industry in this country is dominated by smaller operations close to the market due to the widespread population and relative abundance of aggregate. The Logan Point quarry is one of the largest quarries in the South Island with an annual production of around 250 000 tonnes. The market is mainly based around roading and building in the Dunedin area with some higher quality specialist aggregates being used allover Otago. The quarry has been owned and operated by Palmer and Son Ltd for 106 years with a fifth generation family member the current quarry manager.

Jan 1, 1992

By E S. Bernard

Steel fibre reinforced shotcrete (SFRS) is increasingly being used as ground support in both civil and mining applications. In recent years, methods of assessing the performance of SFRS have been developed. These include the beam test such as that prescribed by ASTM C-1018 and the panel test prescribed in the EFNARC European Shotcreting Standard. The panel test has gained popularity in recent times due to the two-way action modelled in the test. However, some difficulties have been noticed. Shear failures sometimes occur and there appears to be a rather high degree of variability in the panel test results. A new method of testing panels has been proposed. A circular panel supported on three symmetrically arranged points has been assessed at the University of Western Sydney. This paper describes the new test which may be the basis of a new specification for the testing of toughness of SFRS and summarises research work which has been carried out to-date.

Jan 1, 1999

One of the major changes in the resource industry in the nineties has been the re-internationalisation of the industry. The history of the resource business has been one of companies from the developed world utilising the cash flows from their operations to explore and develop mines in less developed regions of the world. This resource development has progressively generated wealth and economic development, which in turn, has led to a new generation of exploration and mining projects. In South America, Chile had led the way in a mining resurgence, now closely followed by Argentina, Brazil, Venezuela and Peru. Although Chile has long had a significant copper mining industry, the pre-nationalisation phase was driven by American capital; the current phase has been spearheaded by R.T.Z. - B.H.P. at Escondida with Canadian junior companies, in particular, providing major speculative impetus. The Australian junior companies have not been significant in South America.

Jan 1, 1995

By Chisholm J. M

Why go to the CIS? The vast mineral potential of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) has long been recognised, but it has taken the lowering of the iron curtain to open up the region to serious mineral development consideration by the Western World. The advent of a free market economy and the emergence of the Independent States with pressing needs for foreign investment has led to a greatly improved investment climate. Coupled with the desire for some of the more entrepreneurial resources companies to head the wave of investment to the region, this sequence of events has promised a great deal, but delivered only modest progress to-date. Potential gold project development has provided the major focus, for three reasons: the region is highly prospective for gold, gold projects tend to have a relatively lower start-up capital cost compared to base metal and fossil fuel projects and finally bullion or refined gold is more readily transportable and easier to sell.

Jan 1, 1996

By Yamakita T, Yoneoka Y

The Chigirishima Smelter of Toho,Zinc Co., Ltd. is the largest independent custom lead smelter in Japan and produces about 60,000 tonnes/yr of electrolytic lead. The quantity of slag produced by blast furnace is approximately 65,000 tonnes/yr, 30,000 tonnes/yr of which is sent back to the sintering plant for mixing with lead concentrates. The remaining slag used to be piled up at the yard until the operation of the fuming plant started in July 1977. We examined the slag fuming process with the purpose of achieving: 1) Improvement of the operating results by recovering zinc and lead from blast furnace slag. The lead content in slag at Chigirishima is slightly high, because the height of blast furnace shaft is low and consequently the quantity of sinter smelted per area at tuyere level is rather large. 2) Production of a salable slag as raw material for cement by lowering zinc and lead content in slag.

Jan 1, 1980

By A Quigley

The Northside Storage Tunnel Project in Sydney includes over 20 km of TBM driven tunnels, over 3 km of declines and major caverns and pump rooms. The paper describes methods used for design on the project. Emphasis is given to the refinement of the use of empirical rock mass classifications, and to the use of discontinuum numerical methods.The use of empirical rock mass classifications in Sydney sandstone has usually led to conservative design because the systems are based on a random orientation of joints in the rockmass. Because the joint sets are usually oriented in a way that is beneficial for tunnelling, limits must be placed on the parameters used in the classifications system. The paper discusses these limits and the derivation of the parameters.The use of numerical methods in Sydney sandstone is discussed. Continuum methods have their uses, but discontinuum methods are preferred. The use of UDEC has been validated against a previous project, the New Southern Railway. Recommendations are given for UDEC models.

Jan 1, 1999

The Charters Towers 1:250 000 Gravity Data Set represents a new initiative of the Department of Resource Industries (DRI, formerly Queensland Department of Mines) to provide high quality regional gravity data over areas of the State that have high potential for new mineral discoveries. The Department has adopted a strategy to upgrade geophysical data to complement the ongoing Regional Geological Mapping Program (RGMP) of this Department and in areas where the data would be of most benefit to the mineral exploration industry. Part of this strategy is to ensure that these data are released within 6 months of data collection.The 1989 Charters Towers survey was completed as a joint project with the Bureau of Mineral Resources, Geology and Geophysics (BMR), and is the first regional geophysical data acquisition project undertaken by the DRI. Prior to this survey, the only gravity data in this area dates from the B MR regional surveys carried out between 1960 and 1967.

Jan 1, 1990

By Grimstone LR, Leach JHJ

An analytical technique is described to identify areas of structural disturbance to coal and interseam strata in coal measures. It is based on exploration borehole data which records seam intersections and interseam lithologies. Computerised data bases have been developed to allow processing of large quantities of borehole records. The case study discussed is located in a tectonic setting dominated by thrust faulting. It provides a mechanism for the identification of low angle and bedding plane faults. In addition it allows the preparation of plans showing the areal distribution of the thrust sheets in the statigraphic section throughout the mine prospect. The technique requires the identification of normal undisturbed depositional thickness of coal seams and interseams to be determined. This is done for coal by the identification of coal ply distribution over the area. For interseam lithologies it is based on sedimentological modelling of lithology distributions, related back to the original depositional environments. Variations from the expected values are interpreted as structural Deformations.

Jan 1, 1986

In order to realise seafloor massive sulfide (SMS) mining, the environmental baseline survey around targeted SMS mining areas and the creation of an environmental assessment technique suitable for quantifying the impacts of ocean floor mining are necessary. The targeted areas generally host large chemosynthetic communities in association with active hydrothermal venting. The ecosystem structure around the chemosynthetic communities has not been clarified yet in macro-scale or quantitatively. The systematic approach and plan for the baseline survey and the environmental assessmentÆs basic studies are introduced. An EXTENDED ABSTRACT is available for download. A full-length paper was not prepared for this presentation.

Jan 1, 2008

By T Christopher

The Campamento Au/Ag deposit, discovered by Linear Gold in 2004, is located in Chiapas State, southern Mexico. The deposit is hosted by a sequence of Pleistocene-Pliocene andesitic volcanic rocks that have been intruded by a feldspar-phyric porphyry complex. Measured and indicated resources are 852 000 oz Au and 3.46 million ounces Ag with inferred resources of 374 000 ounces Au and 920 000 oz Ag. Resources were estimated at a 1.0 g/t Au equivalent cut-off. This is an ABSTRACT only. A full-length paper was not prepared for this presentation.

Jan 1, 2008

By J Shooter

Pezzimenti Laserbore designed, fabricated and commissioned the first microtunnelling machine in Australia in 1986. The System was initially a very basic one, developed in isolation to the overseas explosion in microtunnelling growth headed by Japan and Germany. Market needs in Australia have demanded increasing flexibility in microtunnelling capacity-longer distances, variable ground conditions and larger diameters. The one constant throughout the development process is in maintaining high accuracy û the attribute which most readily differentiates microtunnelling from other limited steering techniques.This paper will highlight the features of microtunnelling by drawing on case studies of completed projects.

Jan 1, 1999

In 1975 the US Bureau of Mines (BOM) under contract with the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), began a systematic mineral resource evaluation of Indian reservations in the United States. The purpose of the BIA/BOM program was to stimulate economic development on Indian lands through exploration and mining ventures with the mining industry. Since that time, 109 phase I reports (literature studies) and nearly 45 phase II and phase III (field studies) reports have been written by the BOM. The various tribes in conjunction with the BIA have access to these reports for decision making regarding mineral resource development.

Jan 1, 1990

The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy and the Australian Mining Industry Council are concerned that a sufficient number of able young people receive an adequate level of professional training for the mineral industry. A Joint Committee on Education has been formed to pursue these objectives. At a time of strong growth in the industry it is most important to forecast the demand for people, so that the educational authorities will be able to provide adequate facilities. The factors to be considered in fore- casting the demand for professional staff are set out, and the proposed method of assessment is outlined.

Jan 1, 1981

Depending on material commodity market conditions, material contained in open pit waste disposals can hold potential value, Segregating subgrade material into separate disposals i.e. 'sub ore' stockpiles, affords open pit operators the opportunity to modify production strategies to reflect changes in market conditions. Discussion of the concept of subore stockpiling is presented. A two-step mathematical model and a nonlinear programme are employed to answer questions such as, 'how can the value of sub-ore material be determined to distinguish sub-ore from true waste?' and 'when and at what rate should sub-ore be processed?'

Jan 1, 1988

The resurgence of mining over the last 30 years has coincided with a growing awareness in the community of the importance of environmental protection and conservation. This involves a growing concern about environmental degradation, an increasing desire for the setting-aside of natural areas for wilderness preservation, accelerating pressures for the return of large areas of Crown land to Aboriginal ownership and a widening view that economic growth itself may be undesirable (Burton, 1987). This has lead to much public debate over the implementation of sound environmental policies to achieve a balance between economic necessities and ecological goals.

Jan 1, 1991

A vigorous seismic and drilling programme has been conducted over.ar area of .59000 square miles in the Roma district during the last three years. The work is Mill' in progress and although many new geological concepts have been discovered, he subsurface geology is not yet finalised. D.atailed examination has shown many variations of .section, has established the general basement trends and sedimentary thicknesses, has shown that much more of the section is marine than previously thought ~nd has indicated that any reservoirs throughout the section could be potential oil ind/or gas producers if suitable traps are located.

Jan 1, 1962

By Cook B, Cunningham J

At Mount Isa Mines, a system has been developed for general monitoring of underground mobile equipment. It can provide unit condition monitoring data such as oil pressures and motor temperatures as well as production type information such as unit location and load. The system does not rely on an expensive data communications infrastructure, using instead inexpensive radio base stations which automatically transfer data from mobile units to a surface database server on the company-wide computer network. This paper includes a general overview of the system and a discussion of the practical benefits it is expected to generate.

Jan 1, 1995

The main iron ore deposits of Western Australia fall into three very different geological classes, which are, in order of importance: hematite enrichment ore, pisolitic limonite ore, and sedimentary ore. These are presently (1973) being mined in the approximate proportions 20 : 2 : 1, while the equivalent proportions for reserves are, very approximately, 200 : 70 : 1. Two minor categories which mar- ginally qualify as ore are detrital material variously referred to as scree ore or canga, and potentially beneficiable iron formation. These two latter types are dealt with very briefly, and the three main categories are dis- cussed in order of economic significance. Hematite enrichment ore results from the selective replacement of a pre-existing host rock by hematite. Almost without exception, this host is cherty banded iron formation (BIF); but certain exceptions have great genetic inter- est. Ore bodies of this kind occur both in the Archaean BIFs of the Pilbara and Yilgarn Blocks and in the Proterozoic BIFs of'the Hamersley Basin. It follows from their virtual restriction to a single kind of sedimentary host that there is strong stratigraphic control over the shape of ore bodies: these may be almost flat, of dyke-like form, or of complex configuration, according to the pre-enrichment structure of the host bed. This structure was an important control over the position in which ore formed:

Jan 1, 1973

Asian countries are now facing very crucial aspects of urban living under the recession of the economy. The current situation is such that those hard aspects may make the living standards worse and worse in the next century, unless proper measures are taken on the infrastructure for urban lives. More than half of the population in Asian countries are now living in cities. Nowadays, the socio-economic development of the Asian countries has been closely linked to the development of world economy because of the border-less economy system. The population inflow to big cities is inevitable as the Asian countries step into an industrialised economy. Such a tendency will be further accelerated when Asia becomes a centre of financial business in the 21st century. The government of any country has realised the situation very well. The United Nations has established a specific agency to solve the problems caused by the rapid urbanisation. This global agency for urbanisation is named United Nations Center for Human Settlement and it is so called Habitat. There are three Habitat offices in the world, Nairobi in Kenya, Santiago in Chile and Fukuoka in Japan. The activities of Habitat offices cover a wide field of issues such as housing, urban development, infrastructure and environment, etc. Habitat Fukuoka Office is serving Asia and Pacific in co-operation with the government offices concerned.

Jan 1, 1999

By A I. M Ritchie, G P. Timms

Monitoring of water infiltration into WhiteÆs waste rock dump at the Rum Jungle mine site in the Northern Territory, Australia, started in 1983, and has since produced a unique and long-running data set. Following closure of the uranium mining operations at the site, a soil cover was constructed on the dump in 1984 primarily to reduce water infiltration into, and the quantity of low quality effluent out of, the waste material. The performance of the cover in reducing water infiltration has been monitored using ten lysimeters installed across the dump prior to construction of the cover. Over the past eight years or so, the average infiltration rate as measured by the ten lysimeters appears to have risen compared to the early years of monitoring. The significance of this apparent increase is discussed given the variability observed in the data from individual lysimeters, and the variability in the rainfall. Estimates of the infiltration rate as measured by each of the lysimeters are examined using statistical tools. It is concluded that the infiltration rate has increased with time and with increasing rainfall. The increase with time is a stronger factor than the increase with rainfall. It is further surmised that the cover system at the locations of the lysimeters is less effective now at reducing infiltration into the dump than it was when newly installed.

Jan 1, 2003