Journal
ENERGIES
Volume 15, Issue 10, Pages -Publisher
MDPI
DOI: 10.3390/en15103797
Keywords
hard rock mine; sill pillar recovery; upper bench level; ground settlement; tangential stress criteria; burst potential index (BPI)
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Funding
- Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada [NSERC RGPIN-2019-04572]
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In this study, the feasibility of recovering sill pillars in a hard rock mine was investigated. Three recovery schemes were proposed and evaluated using a full-sized three-dimensional analysis model and the finite element method. The results showed that all three schemes were feasible and safe, with scheme SBS being the optimum one.
In Canada, many mines have adopted the sublevel stoping method, such a blasthole stoping (BHS), to extract steeply deposited minerals. Sill pillars are usually kept in place in this mining method to support the weight of the overburden in underground mining. To prolong the mine's life, sill pillars will be recovered, and sill pillar recovery could cause failures, fatality, and equipment loss in the stopes. In this paper, three sill pillar recovery schemes-SBS, SS1, and SS2-were proposed and conducted to assess the feasibility of recovering two sill pillars in a hard rock mine by developing a full-sized three-dimensional (3D) analysis model employing the finite element method (FEM). The numerical model was calibrated by comparing the model computed ground settlement with the in situ monitored ground settlement data. The rockburst tendency of the stope accesses caused by the sill pillar recovery was assessed by employing the tangential stress (Ts) criterion and burst potential index (BPI) criterion. All three proposed sill pillar recovery schemes were feasible and safe to recover the sill pillars in this hard rock mine, and the scheme SBS was the optimum one among the three schemes.
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