APSC 150
Case Study 3
Sustainable Mining
- is that possible?
John A. Meech, Professor and Director
Centre for Environmental Research in
Minerals, Metals, and Materials (CERM3)
Norman B. Keevil Institute of Mining Engineering
Who am I?
John Meech
• Professor and Director of CERM3
(Centre for Environmental Research in Minerals, Metals, and Materials)
• Room 508D in the Forward Building
• Email: jameech@gmail.com
• Office: (604)-822-3984
Lectures
Part 1: Protecting the Environment
Lecture 1:
Sustainable Mining – Is that possible?
25/02
Lecture 2:
ARD & the Millennium Plug
27/02
Lecture 3:
Confined Spaces in Mine Reclamation
01/03
Lectures
Part 2: Protecting the Workers
Lecture 4:
Movie: Mine Rescue in Chile
04/03
Lecture 5:
Mine Rescue at UBC
06/03
Lectures
Part 3: Automation and Process Control
Lecture 6:
Process Automation in Mining
08/03
Lecture 7:
Fuzzy Logic Control Systems
11/03
Lecture 8:
Autonomous Haulage Trucks
13/03
Tutorials / Assignments
1: Metal Recovery from Britannia Mine Effluent
- 2 parts
2: Mine Safety Issues
- 2 parts
3: Mine Automation – Fuzzy Control
Part 1: The Environment
• The Miner of the 21st Century must know:
– How
– How
– How
– How
to
to
to
to
monitor emissions
protect the environment
restore a mine site back to other uses
get along with the neighbours
• Mining today is a balance of three elements:
– Techno-economic issues
– Environmental issues
– Socio-political issues
}
Sustainable Mining
Who is a Miner?
• An Engineer with many skills
– Technical and Economic
– Leadership and Management
– Vision and Career Direction
• Mining and Mineral Processing
– Ore Identification and Mine/Plant Design
– Mine Operation (Drilling, Blasting, Loading, Hauling)
– Beneficiation (Liberation, Separation, & Extraction)
– Environmental Control & Safety
What is CERM3?
A multidisciplinary research centre
dedicated to conducting environmental
research for the mining industry
CERM3 Mission Statement
•
Foster High Regard for Sustainable Mining
•
Develop Innovative Methods to Ensure the Future
Sustainability of the Mining Industry
•
Train the Next Generation of Mining Engineers to
Meet the New Demands of the 21st Century
•
Improve the Image of Mining in Society
What is Sustainable Mining?
• How can we possibly mine sustainably?
– When mined, ore bodies are depleted
– Land is consumed
– Land is restored (reclaimed/remediated)
– Communities are sustained
– Best practices are used
– Care and respect is paid to First Nations
X
X




Environmental Monitoring and Control
Hydrosphere:
– Acid Rock Drainage - pH and metallic ion pollution
Atmosphere:
–
–
–
–
–
SO2 Atmospheric Emission - acid rain
Dust
CO2 emissions (and other GHGs)
Arsenic from some gold mining operations
Mercury from artisanal mining operations
Lithosphere:
– Storage of solid waste (tailings and waste rock)
•
•
•
•
dust
slope stability
effluent and solid emissions (catastrophic)
landscape impacts (aesthetic)
Community Issues
• First Nations and Aboriginal People
• land claims and land use
• employment
• traditional use and cultural issues
• Long-term Stability of Small Communities
•
•
•
•
•
creating parallel industries and businesses
providing education and health care
training and apprenticeship programs
governance of the community
mine closure planning
• Global Sustainability
•
•
•
•
poverty reduction in the Third World
cleaning up small-scale and/or legacy mining sites
responsible operation: First World standards
sharing rewards with local communities
Sustainable Decision-making
Economic Issues
• size and grade and type of orebody
• available infrastructure (roads, rail, water, power)
• market conditions and transportation costs
• raw materials supply
Technical Issues
• standard processes and procedures
• innovation (Who wants to be first?)
• automation = Improved Performance and Morale
• safety of the work force and local communities
Socio-Political Issues
• respect for local customs and governance
• risk of political uprisings
• risk of losing social licence to mine
• environmental effects (water, air, landscape)
Gold Associated with Quartz
Pouring a Gold Bar
Canadian Diamonds
99.999% Copper (5-9s)
But besides the Reward, what else?
• Before mining
– plan for the neighbourhood
• During operation
– protect the environment
• After operation
– plan for closure
– mitigate/restore the site
– sustain the communities
– sustain the company
Antamina Tailings Dam, Peru
Reclamation at Bluebell Mine
Island Copper Site Reclamation
After 20 years of operation, the Island Copper Mine began reclaiming its
waste dumps in 1996. Tailings were discharged deep into the adjacent fjord
known as Rupert Inlet.
Island Copper Pit Flooding
Pit was flooded with sea water to create
a meromictic lake – 3 layers:
Top
– clean water;
Middle – a reactor for surface ARD;
Bottom – retain precipitated solids.
Island Copper Pit Flooding
Pit was flooded with sea water to create a 3-layer meromictic lake:
Top
– clean water;
Middle – a reactor for surface ARD;
Bottom – retain precipitated solids.
Deep Sea Disposal of Tailings
MillMill
EZD
– Euphotic depth
UWD – –
Upwelling
depth
EZD
Euphotic
depth
MLD – –
Mixed Layer
depth
UWD
Upwelling
depth
MLD – Mixed Layer depth
Reclaimed slopes –
Bullmoose Mine, B.C.
Reclaimed pit – Igarapé Bahia, Amazon
Mark Creek, Kimberley
• Sullivan mine reclamation activities at
Mark Creek, Kimberley
Reclaimed Meadow – Luscar Coal, AB
Tailings Reclamation at Vale-Inco
Flooded Pits – ARD source
Three-lift Tailings Dam
Tailings Dam failure –
Los Frailes, Spain
Safety in Mining – slope stability
Imagine…
A Mine that is Green and Clean
Reclamation at Bullmoose
Where
• People live, work, and play safely
and local communities can rely on
a long-term future
• First Nations work and
learn about Mining in a
climate that respects
their heritage and culture
Igarapé Bahia Gold Mine,
Carajas, Amazon
• Protection of the environment
is paramount and Society’s
image of Mining is high
Gregg River Coal Mine
Hinton, Alberta
Imagine…
The Centre for Environmental Research
in Minerals, Metals, & Materials
That is
• Located at UBC-Vancouver
and at Britannia Beach
• Linked virtually to institutions
involved with Mining
• Addressing small-scale mining
• Conducting environmental research,
and outreaching to communities
• Developing methods to increase safety,
reduce costs and improve productivity
Research Team Leaders
Ten world-renowned researchers in
their respective fields lead the work
Dirk Van Zyl
Life Cycle Analysis
Waste Management
Sustainable Mining
Small-scale Mining
Mercury Pollution
Marcello Veiga
Research Collaborations
Extensive Links with International Collaborators
Ecole Polytechnique
Mining
Queen's University
Mining
Laval University
Mining and Metallurgy
McGill University
Mining and Metallurgy
King’s College London
Mechanical Eng.
Helsinki University
of Technology
Royal Military Academy
Mechanical Eng.
Cardiff University
Chemical Eng.
University of Oulu
Electrical Eng.
Laurentian University
Mining
Tech. Univ. of Denmark
Agricultural Sciences
University of Alberta
Civil/Mining
Tohoku University
Materials Research Institute
Univ. of Saskatchewan
Civil Eng.
University of Siegen
Inst. of Automatic Control
University of Utah
Mining
University of Haifa
Computational Mathematics
New Mexico State
Mining
University of Queensland
Sustainable Minerals Institute
University of Chile
Mining
Massey University
Soil and Earth Sciences
CETEM
Rio de Janeiro
Uganda
World Bank
Maintenance/
Equipment
Robotics
Waste
Management
UNIDO Global
Hg Project
ARD
Treatment
PhytoReclamation
Super
Computer
M.Eng.
Program
Sustainable
Mining
University of Capetown
Chemical Engineering
Mineral
Processing
Bulk Mining
UBC at Britannia Beach
Britannia Beach
UBC-CERM3 has been involved at Britannia Beach since 2001 when we
installed a plug inside the 2200 Level tunnel to create a research facility.
This plug had the “spin-off” benefit of eliminating all pollution flowing into
Britannia Creek and the surface waters of Howe Sound.
UBC to Britannia Beach
Britannia
Mine
Millennium Plug Research Project
Pollution Plume – pre 2001
Millennium Plug Research Project
Pollution Plume – pre 2001
Outcome – September 2011
Return of Adult Pink Salmon to Britannia Creek
Numerous Media Reports
Performance of CERM3 (2001-2011)
Helped create Bridge Program
linking health care, policy, and
engineering
Bridge Program students wrote
3 successful CIHR proposals
($300,000)
UNIDO Global Mercury Project
is managed under UBC-Mining
Large research efforts on
Waste Management Methods
First group to address pollution
problems at Britannia Mine
UBC-Mining has increased
in population to over 300 people
Decreased Energy in Mining
Facilities:
- Rock Fragmentation Lab
- Simulation Lab
- High-Pressure Grinding Roll
Breakthrough Targets:
- Integration of Mine/Mill processes
- Reduced Comminution Energy
- hyper-velocity strain rates
- lower cost fragmentation
Passive ARD Treatment Systems
Facilities:
- Constructed wetlands & greenhouse
- Phytoreclamation & Microbiology labs
Breakthrough Targets:
- Protocols for passive ARD processes
for use with high flow/high metals
Phytoreclamation
Certain plants selectively accumulate metal ions
from the ground – phyto-remediation/reclamation.
In 2003, CERM3 and Massey University conducted
a full-scale field trial in Brazil for CVRD (Vale) to show
that “phyto-mining” is possible.
Hyperaccumulation of Gold by Plants
07/5/03
in the ground
12/5/03
19/5/03
in the plants
28/5/03
target
0.6 g Au/t >>> 60 g Au/t >>> 100 g Au/t
27/6/03
Sustainable Mining and Communities
Led by
• Dr. Malcolm Scoble
• Dr. Marcello Veiga
Over 25 graduate students
Communities affected by Mining
Small-scale Mining
First Nations and Aboriginal Peoples
Village of Noatak Science Class, Red Dog, Alaska
The Mining Professionals
of the 21st Century
The Mining Professors
of the 21st Century
Ginger Gibson (Ph.D. student) working with NWT Communities
who work at Ekati Diamond Mine (Trudeau Scholar)
Jennifer Hinton (Ph.D. student)
working with women in a
Ugandan Mining Community
The Environment & Small-scale Mining
• Serra Pelada, Amazon
Serra Pelada Pit,
Amazon, Brazil, 1980
The Environment & Small-scale Mining
• Serra Pelada, Amazon
The Environment & Small-scale Mining
• Serra Pelada, Amazon
• Hg use in Gold-Mining
Serra Pelada Pit,
Amazon, Brazil, 1980
The Environment & Small-scale Mining
• Serra Pelada, Amazon
• Hg use in Gold-Mining
• Open-pit Aquaculture
Serra Pelada,
Amazon, Brazil, 2003
The Environment & Small-scale Mining
Cachoeira, Brazil
Guyana
• Serra Pelada, Amazon
• Hg use in Gold-Mining
• Open-pit Aquaculture
• UNIDO Project
 Indonesia
 Africa
(Mozambique, Tanzania, Sudan
Zimbabwe, Uganda )
 South America
(Ecuador, Venezuela, Surinam)
“…islands of prosperity in a sea of poverty…”
after Marcello Veiga,
Head, UN Global Mercury Project
and Professor of Mining Eng. at UBC
Venezuela
Automation in Mining
Continuous, autonomous, bulk methods
CSIRO’s remotely controlled
micro-tunnel drilling technology
Mining Automation
Navigation Instrumentation
Remote Mining from Surface
Magnetic Levitation Hoisting
Team Thunderbird and Autonomous Ground Vehicles
Terry Gong with Bebot Miners
Mag Wheels!
Innovative Mining Processes
• Integration of batch processes
 Hoisting & Underground Haulage
1/4 scale
continuous loop
Magnetic Levitation
Hoisting System
Supervisor: John Meech
Student: Ryan Ulansky
Waste Management Practices
Antamina Mine/Teck-Cominco
Questa Mine/Molycorp
Porgera Mine/Placer-Dome
Led by Dr. Bern Klein and
Dr. Ward Wilson
Waste
Management
and
Mine Closure
Geothermal Energy at Britannia Beach
Graph of Monthly Inflow and Height
(for constant outflow of 620 m3/h)
Geothermal Capacity at the Britannia Mine
Resource and Heat Demand
Month
Available Resource1
Heat Demand2
Ave. inflow (m3/hr)
Temp. (°C)
Capacity (MWt)
Jan
450
10.5
Feb
430
Mar
Future Demand3
kWh t
MW t
MW t
3.23
402,000
0.41
3.38
11.0
3.32
384,000
0.44
3.57
435
11.0
3.36
334,000
0.34
2.81
Apr
505
11.5
4.18
295,000
0.31
2.56
May
885
11.5
7.33
248,000
0.25
2.08
Jun
1240
11.5
10.27
201,000
0.21
1.75
Jul
1035
11.5
8.57
196,000
0.20
1.65
Aug
540
12.0
4.77
202,000
0.21
1.70
Sep
350
12.0
3.09
221,000
0.23
1.92
Oct
375
12.0
3.31
260,000
0.27
2.19
Nov
655
11.0
5.06
318,000
0.34
2.76
Dec
530
10.0
3.51
400,000
0.41
3.36
Total/Ave.
620
11.3
4.98
3,461,000
0.30
2.47
on 95% extraction efficiency, a chill temperature of 4 °C, inflows reported by remediation studies.
on current residential and commercial heating costs (oil, propane, and electricity).
3 based on current demand plus expanded Museum activities and 510 new homes in Britannia N. and S.
1 based
2 based
Heat and Electrical Capacity assuming
constant outflow of 620 m3/hour
Average
Inflow
(m3/hour)
Average
Outflow
(m3/hour)
Flow
Difference
(m3/hour)
Volume
Change
(m3)
Height at
Start of
Month (m)*
Heating
Capacity
(MW t)
Jan
450
620
-170
-126,480
200
Feb
430
620
-190
-127,680
Mar
435
620
-185
Apr
505
620
May
885
Jun
Month
Electrical Capacity
(MW)
(kWh)
4.45
0.39
290,269
180
4.79
0.36
245,168
-137,640
161
4.79
0.34
252,423
-115
-82,800
128
5.13
0.30
213,109
620
265
197,160
100
5.13
0.26
193,576
1240
620
620
446,400
157
5.13
0.33
248,993
Jul
1035
620
415
308,760
223
5.13
0.42
302,049
Aug
540
620
-80
-59,520
263
5.48
0.47
351,137
Sep
350
620
-270
-194,400
255
5.48
0.46
332,842
Oct
375
620
-245
-182,280
230
5.48
0.43
319,194
Nov
655
620
35
25,200
206
4.79
0.40
286,133
Dec
530
620
-90
-66,960
209
4.11
0.40
298,923
Ave./Tot.
620
620
0
0
-
4.99
0.38
3,333,815
* based on measured volume-height relationship determined by 4100 Level Plug Test in 2002.
Financial Analysis Summary
of the four phases of the project (2004 est.)
Lot
Premium1
($x103)
Annual
Revenue
($x103)
Annual
Operating
Costs
($x103)
Excess
Revenue 2
($x103)
Payback
Period
(years)
503
-
79.6
27.3
52.3
9.6
Year 3 Existing – 106 units
2,450 3
-
561.0
133.5
427.5
5.7
Year 4 North - 110 units
1,445
660
330.7
106.6
224.1
3.5
Year 7 South – 400 units
3,244
1,200
1,312.3
439.2
873.1
2.3
Overall
7,262
1,860
2,159.0
706.5
1,452.5
3.7
Phase
Description
Year 1
Demo - 25 units
Capital
Costs
($x103)
1 premium
on each new lot sold of $3,000
2 after local taxes ($50,000) and royalties ($66,820)
3 includes micro-hydropower generation
Rates and royalties assumptions:
Current power rates = $ 0.062 / kWh (residential) and $ 0.069 / kWh (commercial)
Future power rates = $ 0.082 / kWh (residential) and $ 0.089 / kWh (commercial)
Discount rates
= 15% from future BC Hydro rates for residents and business
Royalty payment
= $ 2.00 / MWh for thermal power
Royalty payment
= $ 3.00 / MWh for electrical power
Benefits of CERM3 to Canada
Canadian Mining is recognized as second to none
(research competition from Australia by AMIRA is fierce)
Strengthens our reputation to protect the environment
(emphasizes a global approach to Sustainable Mining)
Commitment to Sustainable Mining
(keeps our industry competitive and in demand)
Create facilities to integrate "soft" and "hard“ research
(Technical and Socio-Political problems and solutions must be exchanged)
Complement Laurentian University initiative
(Centre of Excellence in Mining)
(provides collaboration across Canada in Mining Innovation)
Thanks for your Attention
Good Luck
with the Tutorial Assignments and Quiz