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Resources and Sustainable Materials
Published in Stanley E. Manahan, Environmental Chemistry, 2022
Several approaches are employed in surface mining. Sand and gravel located under water are extracted by dredging with draglines or chain buckets attached to large conveyers. In most cases, resources are in deposits beneath an overburden of earthen material that does not contain any of the resource that is being sought. This material must be removed as spoil. As the name implies, open-pit mining is a procedure in which gravel, building stone, iron ore, and other materials are simply dug from a big hole in the ground. Some of these pits, such as several from which copper ore has been taken in the United States, are truly enormous in size.
Future mineral demand
Published in Natalia Yakovleva, Edmund Nickless, Routledge Handbook of the Extractive Industries and Sustainable Development, 2022
Patrice Christmann, Elias T. Ayuk, Antonio M. A. Pedro, S. Vijay Kumar
Mining activities can easily trigger conflicts with the populations that are impacted by such activities. Large-scale open-pit mining meets ever growing opposition from potentially affected local populations and/or out of broader environmental concerns. In recent years, several large-scale mining projects have been delayed for many years, with much uncertainty about the date they may receive the necessary permits to start their operations. Some of the most prominent cases are Minas Congas (Peru, a gold deposit), Pebble (Alaska, USA; a copper, gold, molybdenum and silver deposit), Schaft Creek (British Columbia; a copper, gold, molybdenum and silver deposit) and the Panguna project (Bougainville Island, Papua New Guinea; a copper, gold and silver deposit). The latter was an operating mine for 17 years, up to 1989 when its operations came to a stop due to the civil war triggered by this operation (Hammond, 2012), probably the worst social drama related to 20th-century mining activities. Mining has not resumed yet (January 2021) despite the remaining resource of 4.6 Mt Cu (Bougainville Copper Limited, 2013) still making it one of the world’s largest copper deposits.
Back analysis for landslide in mine waste dump slope using probabilistic analysis
Published in Reginald E. Hammah, Thamer E. Yacoub, Alison McQuillan, John Curran, The Evolution of Geotech - 25 Years of Innovation, 2021
Gilang Firmanda, Arthur Gemas Pradhana Nayoan
Open pit mining is a mining method by excavating overburden and mining the desired ore (Gold, Silver, Coal, etc.). Open pit mining method in coal mining in Indonesia is still very common, considering that almost all coal mining in Indonesia (i.e. Sumatra and Kalimantan) uses this method. In addition, the geological conditions in the Indonesia on coal mining are very supportive for open pit mining and generally related to syncline-anticline fold structural geology. The aim of any open pit mine design is to provide an optimal excavation configuration in the context of safety, ore recovery, and financial return (Read & Stacey, 2009).
Review of Solution Methodologies for Open Pit Mine Production Scheduling Problem
Published in International Journal of Mining, Reclamation and Environment, 2021
Karo Fathollahzadeh, Mohammad Waqar Ali Asad, Elham Mardaneh, Mehmet Cigla
Surface mining is applicable for mineral resources or orebodies that exist at relatively shallow depths. However, surface mines require waste stripping or the extraction of overlying waste to gain access to the underlying ore or valuable material that generates profit. Therefore, for the orebodies that exist at great depths, waste stripping requirements may reach extreme limits, such that surface mining is no longer considered economic; in these circumstances, the process of underground mining becomes the only option. This confirms that even though the spatial (size, shape, depth and orientation) properties of an orebody play a significant role in the selection of a mining method, the strategic decision between surface vs. underground mining is mainly derived through the economics of a mining operation. If surface mining becomes the method of choice, then the development of reserves and infrastructure commences for a surface mining method that is appropriate to the mineral commodity under consideration [2]. Open pit mining refers to the large-scale (in terms of production) surface mining of metallic (copper, gold, iron, etc.) and non-metallic (limestone, etc.) resources. Figure 1 presents a 3D view of a copper mineralisation or orebody model in the context of an open pit mining operation.
Short-term planning for open pit mines: a review
Published in International Journal of Mining, Reclamation and Environment, 2019
Michelle Blom, Adrian R. Pearce, Peter J. Stuckey
An open-pit mine consists of a set of pits, in which horizontal layers of material (benches) are extracted from the top down. Open-pit mining is suitable for orebodies located close to the surface, with underground mining techniques typically applied where this is not the case. Metal ores including iron, copper and gold, and other materials such as coal, diamonds, limestone and uranium, are commonly extracted using the open-pit mining method. A hierarchy of planning activities take place over the life of an open-pit mine – from operational or day-to-day decision-making on the positioning of equipment, truck dispatch and control of crusher feed characteristics or quality; to long-term and strategic decision-making on the timing of expansions, the introduction or building of new infrastructure and the opening or closing of regions of the mine site. At each horizon (day-to-day to life-of-mine), a planner selects blocks or regions of material (from a block model) to be extracted in each period (or across multiple periods) of the horizon. The nature of this block model, and the timespan represented by these time periods, varies across the planning hierarchy.
A mathematical model for mineable pushback designs
Published in International Journal of Mining, Reclamation and Environment, 2021
Juan L. Yarmuch, Marcus Brazil, Hyam Rubinstein, Doreen A. Thomas
Open-pit mining is an excavation process commonly used for extracting near-to-surface metallic and non-metallic ore deposits. Large scale ore deposits can benefit from the economies of scale offered by the open-pit mining process. Open-pit mines are excavated in phases often referred to as pushbacks, which are mineable units designed to maximise the financial return from the mine.