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By L. G. Wilson

In order to comply with time limitations imposed by this symposium, a very narrow but nonetheless interesting segment of the market has been chosen for discussion of the preparation of a tailor-made product to meet a specific need, and in view of the fact that the barite market is one of the oldest and one of the broadest non-metallic mineral markets in the world, it is necessary that we place this in perspective. Of a recent world annual production; (i.e., 1966 figures released last year in MINERALS YEARBOOK), of some four million tons, the United States consumed over 1/2 million tons, of which approximately 950,000 tons were produced domestically and approximately 700,000 tons were imported. Of this total, something approaching 90% was used for drilling-mud weighting, and of the balance, all but about 60,000 tone is consumed in the production of glass, barium chemicals, aggregates, and other minor uses; thus we are really taking a look at a very minute, however important, and very selective, portion of the total barite-market. The real meat of this paper, after eliminating all irrelevant uses of barite, and delineating the area of discussion, resolves itself into the approach to a favorable marketing area and a specific attack on that area. Cost, to the user, has been, patently, a function of distance, as the basic price of barite has varied very little over the years until recently, and freight rates have been the governing factor. Conversely, the seller of barytes must make concession in the plant price to compensate for distance, if he is to successfully compete.

Jan 1, 1969

By D. Harrington

Ventilation of underground workings consists in establishment of such control of air currents that the underground workers may work in safety, with maximum comfort and efficiency, and without impairment of health; and requires that the mine openings may be made subject to such control of air flow as to remove from these workings at ordinary times harmful gases and dusts, and that, at time of emergency, such as fire or explosion, there may be maintained as much or as little air flow as may be desired covering portions of the mine or the mine in its entirety. Control of air flow is the keystone of any ventilating structure, and this very essential feature is obtainable only by the installation of mechanically-operated fans, together with other;. ventilating devices such as doors, over-casts, regulators, etc. Every mine, large or small, coal or metal, should from the outset be equipped with a fan. While much has been written about natural ventilation and many claims made that in specific mines there is sufficient natural air flow, there are few if any mines, coal or metal, where natural ventilation supplies anything like adequately safe or healthful conditions for underground workers even at ordinary times; and at a time of mine fire or explosion, mines depending upon natural ventilation are practically helpless, and certainly are decidedly dangerous to those unfortunates forced to be in them. While ventilation has practically always been deemed an integral part of coal mining, metal mines have rarely paid much, if any, attention to air circulation until forced to do so by occurrence of some untoward condition or accident. Yet metal mines actually have as great need of efficient circulation of air as have coal mines. The coal mine must remove the dangerous explosive gas, methane, also fumes from explosives and, in occasional places, other gases such as carbon dioxide or nitrogen.

Jan 1, 1933

By C. Gregory Knight

Adequate planning for the development, operation, and reclamation of a surface mine requires attention to present and future uses of land, both on the mine site and in the mine vicinity. This paper outlines land use implications of surface mining, and suggests procedures that could link mine planning, mine operation, and reclamation to more general land use concerns. Mining is viewed as a temporary use of land that may irretrievably commit land resources away from some future activities, but may allow other uses, some of which may have been impossible without mining. The paper accepts the premise that surface mining should attempt to minimize environ-mental damage and to maximize future alternative uses of land by appropriate reclamation. I. The Effect of Surface 1'1ining on Land Use Surface mining is a temporary utilization of the land most often criticized because the disturbances it creates are of far greater duration than the actual extractive operation, Resource recovery disrupts existing activity on the land, at least temporarily, and

Jan 1, 1977

By Jehan Rondot, Raymond Marleau

"Des quartzites trés pars ont été découverts au cours de la cartographie de la region du lac des Martres, étape de l'étude géologique de la region de Charlevoix.On distingue quatre groupes métasédimentaires, tons con tenant des niveaux de quartzite dans an mains deux domaines géologique différents, c'est à l'ouest, clans le do¬maine gneisso-charnockitique que se situent les quartzites du groupe des Martres. Quartzite et gneiss à, grenat et sillimanite, en banes épais, constituent la formation de La Galette. A Pest, dans un environnement gneisso-granitique, les deux groupes métasédimentaires de Saint-Siméon, et de La Malbaie comprennent, par contraste, des bancs pen épais et de compositions variées. Les niveaux de quartzite dépassent rarement 50 m d'épaisseur. L'autre groupe métasédimentaires, celui de Saint-Tite des Caps, recoupé de nombreuses intrusions charnockitiques et granitiques, ne possède que de minces niveaux de quartzite.La pureté et la grande épaisseur des quartzites de La Galette suppose une histoire complexe qui se termine par des depots continentaux de climat aride, par opposition aux depots marins des autres groupes. D'autre part, la presence de ces quartzites an sein de roches Presque anhy¬dres et de haute temperature que sont les charnockites leur confére des caractéristiques de fusion sans decrepitation.Parmi la multitude de depots de quartzite qui existe clans le monde, peu sont de qualité supérieure. Or, de par sa composition chimique, le quartzite de La Galette se compare avantageusement à ceux des meilleurs gisements des Etats-Unis, de l'Europe de l'Ouest et de l'Afrique du Sud. D'accès facile pour l'exploitation, les gisements ne sont qu'à une trentaine de milles de Baie Saint-Paul ou de La Malbaie, sur le Saint-Laurent.L'utilisation en metallurgic prévue pour le quartzite de La Galette comprend la production de silicium, de ferro¬silicium et d'autres alliages de silicium. La composition du quartzite est en outre appropriée pour la production de carbure de silicium et de silicate de sodium. Les fines peuvent être utilisées pour la fabrication du verre et comme matiere de charge"

Jan 1, 1977

By Janice Zinck, Maziar E. Sauber

"To counter the recent uncertainty in the rare earths market, diversify the supply source, and help meet the future demand in this sector Canada initiated development of several new rare earth deposits. In the past few years, a number of various studies on rare earths plant design have taken place mainly covering process development, process selection, and flowsheet design. The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of known domestic and potential resources and reserves of rare earths and their status quo with a focus on the metallurgical processes using the information available in the public domain. Plant designs currently under consideration in Canada are reviewed and evaluated. An outline of the areas of opportunity for selective innovation and technology development in the rare earths flowsheet development and the associated risks and rewards is provided.INTRODUCTIONThe rare earth elements (REE) have a very small annual market, but they are categorized as very strategic metals vital to global economic growth due to their indispensability to the development of modern defence system, green technologies and electronic applications. The International Union of Applied and Pure Chemistry (IUPAC) defines the REE as the 15 elements on the lanthanide series on periodic table of elements, plus yttrium and scandium. REE are classified as light rare earth elements (LREE; La to Gd), and heavy rare earth elements (HREE; Tb to Lu). Physical properties and chemical reactivity of yttrium is similar to those of HREE, thus it is categorized as such. Properties of scandium are not similar enough to classify it as either a LREE or HREE (Weng et al., 2015; Sappin & Beaudoin, 2015). However, the mining industry does not always abide to this definitive classification of the split between LREE and HREE. Therefore, in a comparative study of projects, there is a need to pay attention to how the elements are classified."

Jan 1, 2016

By Ronald L. Gibbs

IN THE BEGINNING Contrary to popular myth, the personal computer can trace its roots back to a time before 1981 and the IBM PC. The seeds of the personal computer revolution were probably founded in 1975 with the release of the Altair (kit) personal computer, first advertised in Popular Electronics. June of 1975 marked the beginning of the Homebrew Computer Club in San Francisco. The founding membership list of the Homebrew Club now reads like a "Who's Who" of those involved in the early development of the personal computer industry. The Apple I computer was created by Steve Wozniak in early 1976 from the newly manufactured MOS Technology 6502 chip. It had 4,000 bytes (4K) of Random Access Memory (RAM] memory, a revolutionary amount of memory in 1976. Another early pioneer, the Commodore Pet computer, was another 6502 machine, but with 8K of memory. Tandy Corporation made its name in the hobby industry with leather kits. They embarked on a new path with the production of the TRS-80 line of personal computers. Most were based on the Z-80 chip, but again, were memory limited. A number of other Z-80 based systems followed later, including the Osbourne and the KayPro Computers. These systems were based on the Digital Research CP/M operating system and had a maximum of 64,000 bytes of memory (64K). The Apple I1 Computer appeared in 1977. Newer models of the original Commodore Pet and an Atari computer followed. These machines were also limited to 64K of memory addressing, and the early models typically shipped with only 16K, 32K, or 48K of memory. The Z-80 and the 6502 were the first truly commercialized CPU chips touting boxes with key- boards, monitors (sometimes a TV), and the ability to expand (peripheral slots for serial communications, centronics parallel communications, etc.1. They all shared one technology, audio tape as a storage media. The use of a portable tape recorder provided inexpensive, if not always reliable, magnetic storage. The tape recorders were typically finicky and required patience to use. Adjustments to the volume control were often needed to find "just-the-right" setting for loading or saving information. This kept the personal computer from being accepted in many markets, and gave it a reputation as a hobbyist or experimenters' toy. In early 1979, Steve Wozniak finished the design of a floppy disk drive and controller. This was a revolutionary design which reduced the "then" standard number of controller chips from fifty-plus, to just eight. With the advent of an affordable floppy disk drive mechanism, the personal computer was about to gain respectability. From a business standpoint, it was now possible to save and reliably retrieve business information. It also provided a superior means of distribution for commercially created software. Commercial software became a commodity rather than an oddity.

Jan 1, 1993

By S Mundell, A Atkins, S van de Water

Geoscientific information management enables the capture, management and delivery of the original geoscientific observations and measurements of the earth’s natural resources. However, original observations and measurements are worth nothing if the quality and integrity of the data can’t be guaranteed. Geoscientific information is one of the fundamental assets enabling miners to make confident and accurate business decisions, whether that is defining a resource model, performing reconciliation, delivering ore reserve reports or meeting environmental compliance requirements. Without access to reliable, validated or verified data it increases the risk of miners using incorrect information for reporting and compliance. Industry codes, such as JORC, or government regulations, such as environmental compliance requirements, must be adhered to and companies should be able to confidently report to these standards. Without having a robust information management framework in place, it becomes a challenge to make trustworthy decisions, report confidently and reduce the risk of non-compliance. As a key initiative, good data governance should form one part of a miner’s information management strategy. Within the mining industry it is common for companies to only consider technology tools as the key focus for compliance whereas a mature information management focus will additionally consider people and process. All three pillars are critical for a miner to have confidence in their data driven decisions. This paper discusses an industry framework for best-practice geoscientific information management based on the observations gathered from analysing data management practices within the mining industry. It focuses on how the three pillars of people, process and technology are crucial elements to improve operational decisions and ensure companies are compliant.

Nov 8, 2021

By Reinhard Bott

The Companhia Mineira de Metais (Brazil) runs a Zn-recovery plant in Tres Marias, federal state Minas Gerais, Brazil. The Zn-production is about 65,000 t/a, This corresponds to a concentrate throughput of about 255,000 t/a with a Zncontent of about 29.5 % at an output of 85 %, The plant is run continuously 360 d/a and 24 h/d, respectively. From this it can be concluded that: Input: approx. 650 - 700 t/d ore-concentrate and approx. 29 t/h ore-concentrate, respectively.

Jan 1, 1990

By Irving Hartmann

Falls of roof in coal mines and means of preventing them have been subjects of study for many years, and ran extensive literature has resulted, Usually each individual paper has placed 'emphasis on one phase of the subject, such as fatalities, nature and extent of nonfatal injuries, methods of tembering (particularly in rooms or other wide places), safety along retreating rib lines, and methods of causing falls in abandoned areas. It is only in recent years that there has been persistent question as to why

Jan 1, 1941

By Karl J. C. Harries

"6.1. INTRODUCTIONThis chapter comments on some of the more common types of agreements related to property examination and acquisition, other than the farm-in/joint venture agreement or common undertaking, which is dealt with in the next two chapters. Many of the comments made in Part IV of Chapter 4 apply equally to any such agreement. In addition, many of the comments in Chapter 8 and the examples in Volume II are most certainly relevant to many other types of agreement.6.2. RIGHTS OF FIRST REFUSAL1A right of first refusal is a right that obligates an owner to offer his property, or an interest therein, to the holder of the first right if the owner intends to sell or otherwise dispose of it. It may be triggered either by the owner wishing to offer his property for sale or by receipt of a bona fide offer to purchase his interest from an “outside” third party. The mechanics and procedures to implement a first right should be set out clearly in the agreement, and their basics are the same, whether the first right is a stand-alone document or is part of an acquisition agreement.2Rights of first refusal are common in agreements to permit some control over the disposition of an interest and there they can be a valuable provision. However, some explorationists feel that they are also a good stand-alone agreement to have while a property is being evaluated to decide whether or not it is worth optioning. The reasoning is that such an arrangement will tie up the property to allow a quick look and, if the property looks interesting, the balance of the term of the first right will give an ample exclusive period of time to negotiate with the owner and settle an acquisition agreement. In addition, the explorationist is protected by the first right if the owner decides to negotiate a deal with another party."

Jan 1, 2003

By Irving Hartmann

Falls of roof in coal mines and means of preventing them have been subjects of study for many years, and an extensive literature has resulted. Usually each individual paper has placed emphasis on one phase of the subject, such as fatalities, nature and extent of nonfatal injuries, methods of tembering (particularly in rooms or other wide places), safety along retreating rib lines, and methods of causing falls in abandoned areas. It is only in recent years that there has been persistent question as to why

Jan 1, 1941

By N Herault

PT Freeport Indonesia recently completed preproduction development and construction of the Big Gossan underground copper and gold mine, located in the Ertsberg mining district of Papua, Indonesia. Production has commenced with an expected ramp-up to full production of 7000 tonnes per day in 2012. The Big Gossan utilises an open stoping mine method with paste backfill.In order to deliver ore to the mill, which sits in a valley above the ore deposit, an underground production shaft and hoisting facility was designed and constructed as the key component of ore haulage. The design and construction of the Big Gossan shaft posed many challenges to the project team. Available shaft design and construction expertise were limited as this was the first shaft of its kind in Indonesia and the project was undertaken during a time of high industry demand for new shaft systems. Construction resources were also limited due to the remote location and competition with existing, producing mines for these resources and skills. The project also taxed the ability of Freeport to provide services and resources to this as well as their other projects.Completion of the Big Gossan shaft was a milestone in PT Freeport Indonesia’s plan to fully transition ore production to the underground environment in this decade.This paper deals with the various challenges faced by PT Freeport Indonesia and shaft contractor, PT Redpath Indonesia, during the construction of the Big Gossan shaft and offers suggestions to improve future shaft projects of a similar nature.

Mar 21, 2011

Jan 1, 2000

By Gerald L. Colborne

The major role of financial institutions in the free world in the development of mineral resources is to provide the necessary capital in the form of loans to underwrite the development of these resources by the industry on a stable and continuous basis. This capital provided by the depositors to the bank must be invested in sound projects where the degree of risk is relatively small, the return on the investment is reasonable and the time to retire the loan is of short duration. Money is, therefore, one of the important ingredients along with technology, manpower and an exploitable resource that will provide a sound economic base in this region of development. Canadian banks are similar to banks of other western nations, although each country has some differences in their banking systems. The basic difference between the American and Canadian systems is that the former employs unit banking while the Canadian utilizes the more mobile branch system, which is prohibited or restricted in the United States and some other countries. Canadian banks are the subject of this paper, so, subsequent material will relate to Canadian banks unless indicated otherwise. It will be realized by everyone that the mineral industry is only one area of the economy in which the banks are interested and to cover the subject matter in the time allowed, the topic is restricted to mineral resource development. In Canada this is a vital sector of our economy and before we outline some of the details of financing and services involved in various aspects of mineral development, a review of the Canadian mineral industry is a necessary part of the sequence of presentation. The writer presents this material as a resource engineer advising a major bank in mineral matters, so the presentation may relate more to the financial problems of the developer

Jan 1, 1972

By C. E. Brechtel

This project describes the design and testing of large face ventilation systems for oil shale mining. A design data base was generated by reviewing general industry practice, oil shale industry planning, and technical literature. Conceptual designs for seven different systems were developed and evaluated for suitability. A large, free-standing, jet fan and reversible fan with rigid duct were selected for fabrication and testing. The two systems were field tested in a dead-end heading 55 ft wide by 30 ft high and 320 ft long. System performance was optimized using measurements of air flow direction and air velocity. Total system performance was then measured using SF6 tracer gas released to simulate blast fumes, hot diesel exhaust, methane layering and methane from a blasted muckpile. Field testing indicated that both systems delivered similar performance. The jet fan offered some clear advantages because of its mobility, ease of oper-ation and lower power requirement. It also offered some functional advantages in ventilating for methane because of it high average velocity.

Jan 1, 1985

By T. T. Campbell

Although secondary recovery of lead and lead-tin alloys has been common practice in the United States during recent years, there is little published in-formation concerning recovery techniques. Available information does not cover metal recovery from wet dross skimmings. This investigation by the Bureau of Mines was undertaken to develop techniques that would allow lead-tin alloys to be recovered from wet dross skimmings containing large amounts of zinc chloride. A process was developed, on a laboratory scale, for recovering lead-tin alloys from wet solder dross skimmings. Straight water leaching, either with or without a second leaching operation carried out with a Na2C03 addition for removing chloride, produced a dross that could be smelted without further treatment. Overall recoveries averaging 92 percent of the metal values in the dross were obtained in the form of lead-tin alloys, which had an average tin content of 16 percent and lead content of 84 percent. The recovered alloy contained less than 0.02 percent zinc, as determined by both chemical and spectrographic analyses.

Jan 1, 1956

By Jay S. Gunasekera

Since great emphasis is being placed on the manufacturing science and processing science programs in the Department of Defence and other government research agencies and industries; currently, extensive research on computer aided design(CAD)/ computer aided manufacturing (CAM)/ and computer aided engineering (CAE) is being conducted at Ohio University (OU) . OU has invested over a million dollars in CAD/CAM hardware and software. Design and analysis packages like ALPID, NIKE, STREAM, SHEAR, POLY_FLON, RINGROLL have been developed or modified at OUusing finite element method, finite difference techniques or enhanced slab analysis. Packages like ABAQUS, FLUENT, and NASTRAN have been extensively used.

Jan 1, 1990

By N. V. Hansell

l. INTRODUCTION. THE last few years have shown an increasing interest in the subject of beneficiating iron-ores -in all iron-producing countries. In the United States, this movement has been slower than in certain parts of Europe, for the obvious reason that the abundance and relative cheapness of the Lake Superior iron ores has hindered the development of enterprises for the preparation of low-grade ores. Gradually, however, conditions have changed. The world's consumption of iron is increasing enormously. Being in 1900 about 40,000,000 tons, in 1910 ii was already 60,000000; and there is no reason to doubt that for the near future the increase in iron-consumption will continue at the same rapid rate, especially with, the development of China, certain parts of Africa, and other regions which have hardly been touched as yet by modern industrialism. It is. therefore, not surprising that apprehension is felt that the known available iron-ore resources of the world are gradually being depleted. Signs of this feeling are the recent investigation, under the direction of the U. S. Geological Survey, of the iron-ore resources of the United States, and the estimate presented to the last International Geological Congress, at Stockholm, Sweden, of the iron-ore resources of the world. These investigations have emphasized the fact that the known high-grade ore-deposits are limited in extent, and will, at a not distant future, be exhausted, compelling the iron industry to depend for raw material on the enormous deposits of low-grade ores which are distributed over almost all the world. The discovery of new deposits of high-grade ore, in countries not yet thoroughly explored, will not materially change this prospect. Of course, the part which such new deposits will play in the future cannot be forecast. The difficulty and cost of transportation will probably exclude many of them from use at the present centers of the iron industry.

May 1, 1912

By John Fritz

MEMBERS of the American engineering societies who were in London and Paris during the last days of. June and early July were present at many interesting gatherings. The official delegates of the Founder societies were the specially honored guests of the foreign engineering societies, but other American engineers took part in the meetings. The members of the delegation were: Arthur S. Dwight, Charles F. Rand, William Kelly, representing A. I. M. E.; Ambrose Swasey (general chairman of deputation), Ira N. Hollis, Jesse M. Smith, representing A. S. M. E.; F. B. Jewett, A. E. Kennelly, G. O. Squier, representing A. I. E. E.; Charles T. Main, Robert A. Cummings, John R. Freeman, D. C. Henny, representing A. S. C. E.

Jan 1, 1921

By Jean-Louis Robert

Field work inaugurated in 1962 in the townships of Lemieux and Lesseps, in the Gaspe Peninsula of Quebec, has permitted the author to delineate the lithologic units of the area, to elucidate a few stratigraphic problems and to outline several zones of alteration. Certain features of these zones and the numerous mineralized showings in the area merit the attention of prospectors and exploration companies.

Jan 1, 1966