Tag Archives: ANDRITZ

Arafura Rare Earths appoints Worley-owned Chemetics for Nolans sulphuric acid plant

Arafura Rare Earths says it has entered into an agreement for the supply of the sulphuric acid plant for its 100%-owned Nolans neodymium-praseodymium (NdPr) project in the Northern Territory of Australia.

The sulphuric acid plant will be supplied by Chemetics® Inc, a global supplier of sulphuric acid and other specialty chemical facilities, and a wholly-owned subsidiary of Worley.

The sulphuric acid plant for Nolans will utilise Chemetics proprietary CORE-SO2 process which significantly reduces capital cost, maintenance cost and sulphur dioxide emissions from the plant. The Chemetics plant is also significantly smaller than a traditional sulphur burning acid plant allowing increased use of modularisation reducing the volume of site installation labour. These savings were incorporated into the recent Nolans project update.

The initial work package includes finalisation of specifications and engineering design to allow the plant to be incorporated into the overall project design.

Arafura’s General Manager Projects, Stewart Watkins, said: “Letting the contract for the supply of the acid plant to a global supplier such as Chemetics provides confidence around the outcomes for the project when the team reaches commissioning. Along with that, the progress made on the selection of our key vendors and placement of long lead orders means that we are set to commence early works construction in the coming weeks.”

As well as the sulphuric acid plant, the company has also placed several other the orders during recent weeks which are on the critical path for the project, including:

  • Sulphation bake and cooler paddle dryers with ANDRITZ, primarily to secure detailed design and long lead materials for fabrication;
  • Pipe supply for the first 8 km of HDPE piping for the main water supply pipeline from the borefield to the plant site, which is required for early construction works;
  • Potable and wastewater treatment plants for the construction camp; and
  • Equipment and tankage for temporary construction water supply in advance of the pipeline being installed to site.

Weir Minerals and Andritz expand tailings processing collaboration with IsoDry

Weir Minerals and Andritz have signed an agreement at MINExpo 2021 expanding their shared commitment and strategic cooperation to supply equipment for processing tailings in the mining industry.

The foundations of this agreement have been built on a shared understanding and vision to enable the sustainable and efficient delivery of the natural resources essential to create a better future for the world, they say.

Since 2018, Weir Minerals’ and Andritz’s partnership has seen them collaborate on joint tailings projects. This shared history as partners has reinforced their abiding belief that, together, both Weir Minerals and Andritz are stronger, they said.

This shared success has led both Weir Minerals and Andritz to renew their ongoing commitment and announce they’ll be expanding their offer to all regions around the globe.

Using Andritz’s proven separation and dewatering technologies, Weir Minerals says it has strengthened its whole-of-mine capabilities, showcasing market-leading products from extraction to comminution, mill circuit and tailings management.

“Weir Minerals has been providing tailings solutions for decades; we have dedicated research facilities – the Weir Technical Centre in Melbourne, Australia, and the Sustainable Mining Centre in Venlo, Netherlands – that are challenging conventional ways of thinking about tailings, while also developing practical, innovative and sustainable solutions that will reduce operating costs and improve safety,” Ricardo Garib, Weir Minerals Division President, said.

“Decreasing ore grades mean that mines are producing more tailings than ever before. One of the challenges with tailings management is that there cannot be a one-size-fits-all approach; each mine requires a tailored solution that carefully considers the minerals being processed, as well as the site’s climatic and geological conditions. Weir Minerals prides itself on having both the expertise and equipment that allows us to partner with miners everywhere to plan and implement tailings solutions based on their operations’ unique challenges and this agreement with Andritz enhances those capabilities,” he said.

Steve Huff, President Andritz Separation, said: “Andritz has a long history working across a range of different industries. We are very proud of the work we’ve done with Weir Minerals; together, we’re excited about continuing to provide a joint offering of sustainable and value-added tailings solutions. Both companies bring a different expertise and know-how to the partnership; we complement one another and ultimately, it’s our customers who’ll benefit.”

Tailings management forms an important element of Weir Minerals’ broader integrated solutions approach, which considers problems and challenges from all perspective and draws on a range of experts – process engineers, design engineers, product experts and materials scientists, among others – to identify potential challenges and opportunities and provide tailored solutions.

Charlie Stone, Weir Minerals VP Sales and Business Development-Mill Circuit, said: “This latest agreement enhances our overall tailings offering and enables us to provide our customers with a complete tailings solution. Under the brand name IsoDry, we will continue to offer customers a range of mechanical separation technologies, such as thickeners, filter presses, centrifuges, and vacuum belt filters.”

Weir Minerals has strengthened its tailings team to support the market and ensure that it can provide innovative solutions based on each customer’s specific requirements.

The agreement provides the opportunity for potential future collaboration on technology, harnessing Andritz’s separation technology in conjunction with Weir Minerals’ minerals and tailings processing technology. Many of these products – Warman® pumps to transport fluid tailings, GEHO® pumps to handle paste, Cavex® hydrocyclones to dewater tailings and the Multiflo® range of dewatering solutions – have been integral to helping miners manage their waste for generations, they said.

Weir Minerals and Andritz have also reiterated their shared commitment to sustainability; it is an essential part of both their business and corporate strategies. Both companies say they have outlined ambitious plans to reduce their carbon emissions, while their approach to ESG initiatives extends to all aspects of their organisations.

ANDRITZ ups the filtration ante with new ME2500 filter press

ANDRITZ has introduced a new filter press, the ME2500, to complete its range of “proven” A4F and the SE series filter presses for the mining and minerals industry.

The ME2500 is the best-fit for fast processing of tailings (also with high clay content) or mining concentrates like iron, copper, lead or zinc, the company says. The new model has an hourly processing capacity of up to 450 kg/sq.m, a filtration area of up to 840 sq.m, and features chained plates for faster filter cake discharge. These attributes enable the highest throughputs without compromising on safety, while reflecting a customer focus on saving water, ANDRITZ says.

The innovative closure system on the ME2500 largely replaces hydraulic components with electrical ones and further reduces cycle times, thus increasing capacity and operating availability.

“The increased use of electrical components enables highly sustainable operation of the filter press by reducing the amount of hydraulic oil needed, as well as improving safety thanks to more precise control and less reliance on high-pressure lines that are susceptible to leaks,” the company said.

In addition, and to further optimise the productivity of single machines or plants with multiple filter presses, all modules of the ANDRITZ intelligent filter press – controlled by the Metris addIQ control system – are also available for the ME2500 filter press and can be provided with the full range of options. This draws on smart sensors, data analytics and augmented reality, including multiple sensors to allow for online safety monitoring of the plate package and moveable parts.

The company concluded: “The safe disposal of tailings generated by the mining and minerals sector is a significant cost factor for the industry. ANDRITZ is known for its innovative range of overhead and sidebar filter presses that meet the industry’s most stringent requirements with regard to fast cake discharge and saving water and costs. The maintenance-friendly equipment from ANDRITZ is easily upgradeable, with a modular design for customised process solutions.”

ANDRITZ hopes to bring autonomous plant operation to mineral processing

After being crowned the winner of #DisruptMining 2019, ANDRITZ is now ready to negotiate a contract or investment of up to C$1 million ($750,480) with Goldcorp.

The live finale of the 2019 #DisruptMining, the innovation accelerator that offers entrepreneurs a platform to bring disruptive and exponential technologies to the sector, took place last night on the sidelines of the annual Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada event in Toronto, Canada.

Sohail Nazari (second from right), Business Development Manager, ANDRITZ, and Arthur Gooch (second from left), Director of Innovation, ANDRITZ, said: “We thank Goldcorp and KPMG for their tremendous leadership driving innovation and digitalisation forward in mining. We are excited to be part of Goldcorp’s success to bring autonomous plant operation to mineral processing and we look forward to getting to work.”

David Garofalo (left), President and CEO, Goldcorp, said: “Innovation doesn’t stop or start with one idea, one technology, or one company. For the mining industry to reach the demands and potential of the 21st century, every company must step up and innovate. We must all be safer, more efficient, and responsible and we’ll get results faster through collaboration and the kind of break-through thinking the #DisruptMining platform is meant to uncover for our industry.”

ANDRITZ, a supplier of machines and automation solutions worldwide, developed a unique and continuous way of training artificial intelligence to operate a mineral processing facility using ANDRITZ’s digital twin as part of its award winning concept, Goldcorp said. “The AI is trained to respond to a variety of situations, making it capable of adapting to changing inputs and improving recovery time. The trained AI’s ability to quickly process information and recommend data-driven solutions will allow for the improvement of the operation, such as start-up and shutdown, and assist operators to achieve plant-wide optimisation.”

Deciding the fate of the three finalists was a panel of industry judges including Ian Telfer (Chair of Goldcorp), Katie Valentine (Partner at KPMG Australia and Global Head of Mining Consulting), Sue Paish (CEO of Canada’s Digital Technology Supercluster), Jacob Yeung (University of British Columbia student and #DisruptMining UBC Captain) and Wal van Lierop (President and CEO, Chrysalix Venture Capital).

Net proceeds of C$200,000 from the #DisruptMining live finale will be granted toward mining, innovation and technology scholarships to the University of British Columbia, Garofalo announced.

ANDRITZ’s AI mineral processing concept named #DisruptMining 2019 winner

ANDRITZ, and its artificial intelligence-backed mineral processing facility operation concept, has been named #DisruptMining 2019 winner at the event in Toronto, Canada.

The company was one of three finalists selected to pitch to a panel of judges at the live finale, which took place last night.

ANDRITZ, which is a leading supplier of machines and automation solutions worldwide, has developed a unique and continuous way of training artificial intelligence to operate a mineral processing facility using ANDRITZ’s digital twin, Goldcorp, which hosts the event on the sidelines of the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada’s annual gathering, said.

“The AI is trained to respond to a variety of situations, making it capable of adapting to changing inputs and improving upset recovery time,” Goldcorp said. The trained AI’s ability to quickly process information and recommend data-driven solutions will allow for the improvement of the operation, such as start-up and shutdown, and assist operators to achieve plant-wide optimisation, the company added.

Todd White, Goldcorp Chief Operating Officer and Executive Vice President of Operations, previously said: “#DisruptMining continues to represent the best of innovation in the mining industry. These finalists demonstrate break-through thinking and help build digital momentum in mining. The industry needs to help accelerate the development of these kinds of technologies.”

ANDRITZ beat off stiff competition from Anaconda Mining, which has developed a two-stage drilling method to enable economic mining of narrow-vein deposits, and Voith Turbo, a division of Voith GmbH & Co KGaA, whose Internet of Things application, BeltGenius, creates a digital twin of belt conveyors providing real-time insight into the behaviour of the operation.

ANDRITZ pumps draining flooded mining tunnels in South Africa

Just as IM’s water management feature goes live, ANDRITZ has released details of a project it has been working on to de-water old mines in Johannesburg, South Africa.

South Africa has been dealing with an acid water problem in recent years. Underneath the old gold mining city of Johannesburg is a lake containing heavily contaminated water, which spreads horizontally and vertically into the abandoned pits of the former gold mines, according to ANDRITZ.

The water line has reached a critically high level, as determined by the specialists from the ANDRITZ subsidiary, ANDRITZ Ritz, in Schwaebisch Gmuend, Germany, which was given the first order to drain the mine water back in 2010.

The execution of the project was delayed by four years, however, and it was only in Spring 2014 that two powerful ANDRITZ submersible motor pumps were installed in the middle of Johannesburg city centre, in the so-called ‘Central Basin’. Each pump is capable of bringing 1,500 m³/h (1.5 million litres per hour) of water to the surface, according to ANDRITZ; with 60 million litres of water per day pump, it is a never-ending task, ANDRITZ said.

“In Johannesburg, however, acid mine water is an ongoing problem. Rainwater seeps into the tunnels and reacts chemically with residual minerals like pyrite, producing corrosive sulphuric acids. In the worst case scenario, this can result in a pH value of 2, which is enough to cause lasting damage to humans and the environment.

“Because of this corrosive acid, the Johannesburg pumps had to be completely redesigned. The design is based on ANDRITZ’s proven HDM (Heavy Duty Mining) technology, which uses the concept of a double-suction pump. The thrusts produced are offset by the counter-rotating arrangement of the impellers and the pumps run without axial thrust, giving a properly maintained pump a service life of 10 to 15 years.”

The pumps for the Johannesburg project are a tailor-made, customised design built for this special individual application, according to ANDRITZ. Part of the new system is an encapsulation of the submersible motors (see top photo), which enables the creation of an internal pressure higher than the external pressure. This prevents the intrusion of the corrosive water and the components inside the motor being attacked and possibly destroyed. “At the same time, the water being drained is used to cool the motor by means of a heat exchanger,” ANDRITZ said.

ANDRITZ engineers spent weeks developing the sophisticated technology needed to encapsulate the motor so it could withstand the higher internal pressure. The first two pumps have been running since June 2014. These 21-t pumps, each 15 m long with a 1-m diameter, were installed side by side in March, 5 m apart, but could only be started after completion of the water treatment plant.

Freely suspended on 430-m-long duplex steel pipes, they transport the acid mine water to the surface and onwards into an adjacent treatment plant (pictured). Here, through the addition of lime, the pH value is raised, the acid is neutralised and the heavy metals dissolved in the water are absorbed and precipitated as hydroxides, ANDRITZ said.

The South African authorities are planning a total of three pumping stations, which will each be developed at the mines’ disused extraction shafts. In addition to the Central Basin in Johannesburg’s city centre, invitations to tender for the ‘Eastern Basin’ and the ‘Western Basin’ are currently in progress, according to ANDRITZ.

“The long-term goal is to force the water level in the flooded mines back from its current level of approximately 200 m to a depth of 1,000 m, and to keep it there, to then be able to begin mining gold and gold ore in the drained upper layers of the mines once again,” the company said.

Goldcorp narrows down finalists for #DisruptMining PDAC showdown

Goldcorp has announced the three finalists selected to pitch to a panel of judges at the #DisruptMining 2019 live finale taking place around the PDAC event in Toronto, next month.

The trio includes companies looking at a new drilling approach that can unlock the value in narrow vein deposits; a unique way of training artificial intelligence (AI) to autonomously operate a mineral processing facility; and an Internet of Things application that increases the intelligence of belt conveyors used to transport material at mine sites, according to Goldcorp.

Todd White, Goldcorp Chief Operating Officer and Executive Vice President of Operations, said: “#DisruptMining continues to represent the best of innovation in the mining industry. These finalists demonstrate break-through thinking and help build digital momentum in mining. The industry needs to help accelerate the development of these kinds of technologies.”

After a technical review by a group from the University of British Columbia, shortlisted submissions were reviewed by senior Goldcorp representatives to determine semi-finalists and finalists for #DisruptMining, Goldcorp said. The three finalists pitching their disruptive technology to the panel of judges are:

  • Anaconda Mining, a TSX-listed gold mining company operating in Atlantic Canada, has developed an innovative, two-stage drilling method that enables economic mining of narrow-vein deposits, according to Goldcorp. The technology, known as Sustainable Mining by Drilling (SMD), was developed in collaboration with Memorial University of Newfoundland. Goldcorp said: “SMD has the potential to unlock value in existing deposits that were previously thought to be uneconomic to mine using traditional underground or surface mining methods. The developers also expect this technology could extend the life of current operations by allowing safe excavation to occur beyond the limits of current designs”;
  • ANDRITZ, a leading supplier of machines and automation solutions worldwide, has developed a unique and continuous way of training artificial intelligence to operate a mineral processing facility using ANDRITZ’s digital twin, Goldcorp said. “The AI is trained to respond to a variety of situations, making it capable of adapting to changing inputs and improving upset recovery time,” Goldcorp said. The trained AI’s ability to quickly process information and recommend data-driven solutions will allow for the improvement of the operation, such as start-up and shutdown, and assist operators to achieve plant-wide optimisation, and;
  • Voith Turbo, a division of Voith GmbH & Co KGaA, whose IoT application BeltGenius (pictured) creates a digital twin of belt conveyors which provides real-time insight into the behaviour of the operation. “Resulting from a constant learning system, this information is used to identify potential risks and inefficiencies, allowing for greater uptime, more efficient energy use, predictive maintenance and optimisation of weight and speed,” Goldcorp said. With BeltGenius, mine sites can operate their belt conveyors with greater control and consistency, increasing their savings on repairs and material transportation costs while reducing the environmental impact of traditional haul trucks.

Deciding the fate of the three finalists will be Ian Telfer, Chair of Goldcorp; Katie Valentine, Partner at KPMG Australia and Global Head of Mining Consulting; Sue Paish, CEO of Canada’s Digital Technology Supercluster; Jacob Yeung, University of British Columbia student and #DisruptMining UBC Captain; and returning #DisruptMining judge Wal van Lierop, President & CEO, Chrysalix Venture Capital.

Co-hosted by KPMG, the #DisruptMining live finale will take place on Sunday, March 3, 2019 at the Rebel Entertainment Complex in Toronto during the PDAC convention. Each finalist will present a short pitch video followed by a Q&A with the judges, in front of a live audience of nearly 600 people, demonstrating how their concept or technology has the potential to #DisruptMining.

In addition to finalists, six semi-finalists will showcase their technologies at the #DisruptMining Innovation Expo. The Expo will take place on Sunday March 3, 2019, at the Rebel Entertainment Complex in Toronto.