Tag Archives: Seneca

SNC-Lavalin to lead on engineering, procurement for NMG’s graphite plant build

Comminution of minerals, Energy minerals, Mineral project development, Mining services, , , , , , , ,

Nouveau Monde Graphite has awarded SNC-Lavalin, in partnership with Seneca and Boucher-Lachance Architects, the contract for detailed engineering and procurement services for the construction of its concentrator as part of its Matawinie graphite project, in Quebec, Canada.

Engineering work is already underway to complete priority activities by the end of the December quarter of 2019, including the process review, a Class 2 estimate, and a risk and opportunity assessment to optimise infrastructure design and generate savings, NMG said.

In 2015, Nouveau Monde discovered a graphite deposit on its Matawinie property, located in Saint-Michel-des-Saints, 150 km north of Montréal. It completed a feasibility study in 2018, which revealed strong economics with projected high-quality graphite concentrate production level of 100,000 t/y over a 26-year period.

Eric Desaulniers, President and CEO of Nouveau Monde, said: “With an impressive track record in concentrator design, procurement and project management in Quebec, the selected firms will facilitate the commissioning of commercial operations to supply the market with high-quality graphite.”

The entire project will be carried out in virtual design & construction (VDC), enabling integrated and dynamic modelling of the building information modelling (BIM) engineering for the concentrator, according to NMG.

“This innovative platform will facilitate the transfer from engineering to construction and then to operation,” the company added.

NMG’s master team, part of the management team and composed of senior specialists with several decades of experience each, will act as experts to validate the engineering, the procurement strategy and the technical specifications for the equipment, it said.

The engineering work will also take advantage of process optimisations identified at the Matawinie demonstration plant (pictured), which has been operational for one year. With a few hundred tonnes of graphite concentrate produced to date, the operation has demonstrated exceptional ore quality and a high-performance process to achieve a graphite purity of 97% on average and up to 99% for the largest flakes, according to NMG.

Nouveau Monde leverages this production, which is segregated into several granulometric categories ranging from flakes of more than 0.3 mm (+50 mesh) to the finest products of less than 0.1 mm (-150 mesh), to supply potential customers with samples so they can test the concentrate and confirm their commercial intentions. The demonstration plant will also be the preferred training platform for future Nouveau Monde employees to accelerate the start-up of operations thanks to process knowledge and hands-on experience with similar equipment.

Desaulniers concluded: “Nouveau Monde’s mining project has really taken off in recent months now that we have a solid foundation for our Matawinie graphite project. Our demonstration plant has validated the effectiveness of our treatment process, which is now being optimised by our team of experts in anticipation of the commercial plant. Next year promises more achievements as we complete the design of our operation, reserve key equipment and crystallise our customer base.”

Paradigm Shifters qualify for round two of Canada’s Crush It! Challenge

Comminution of minerals, Environmental, IoT, Mineral processing, Mining equipment, Mining industry recognition, Mining services, Mining software, Mining techniques, Sustainable mining, , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

A group of companies called ‘The Paradigm Shifters’ has made it to the next round of a challenge aimed at reducing the amount of energy that crushers and grinders use in the mining process.

The Crush It! Challenge is spearheaded by the federal government (Impact Canada), in cooperation with Natural Resources Canada (NRCan), the Centre for Excellence in Mining Innovation (CEMI), and Goldcorp.

Crushing and grinding account for upwards of 50% of mine site energy consumption and up to 3% of all the electric power generated in the world.

iRing Inc is the lead partner within The Paradigm Shifters and has coordinated the effort with proposal partners to respond to the challenge, it said.

The company explained: “Essentially the team proposes to bring together the processes and technology that could reduce or even eliminate the need for expensive primary crushers, and reduce the energy required by secondary crushing (potentially eliminating it as well) and grinders in both mines and quarries globally.”

The Crush It! Challenge has several qualifying rounds and, if successful in getting to Round 3, then the team will be eligible to receive C$800,000 ($605,397) in seed funding to further prove the concept over a one-and-a-half-year period. At the end of that period, if the team wins the chance to move forward, the project would be eligible to receive an additional C$5 million in funding to commercialise the products and concepts.

The Paradigm Shifters team consists of:

  • iRing Inc (North Bay) Challenge Project Lead – Drill and blasting software;
  • Nexco Inc (North Bay) – Producer of the energy-variable explosive product;
  • Boart Longyear (North Bay and global) – Global supplier of market leading drilling products and services;
  • Paige Engineering Ltd (PEL) (North Bay) – Design and fabrication of explosive manufacturing and loading equipment;
  • Seneca (Montreal) – Explosive plant engineering, design and build;
  • Maptek (Denver and Global) – 3D laser scanner/fragmentation measurement capabilities, and;
  • Bomon Capital (Toronto) – Long term financing should the team succeed.

The savings that could accrue to mines and quarries annually is C$12.8 billion (25% reduction) to C$25.6 billion (50% reduction), according to iRing.

“If all mines in the world adopted this solution, it would represent a reduction equivalent to 7-13% of all the carbon released in Canada, and 20-41% of Canada’s contribution to meeting the Paris Accord agreement.”

iRing will use its software, Aegis, to design the blasting patterns based on the fragmentation requirements. Boart Longyear will deploy recently developed high speed diamond drilling technologies and instrumentation solutions to quickly and accurately drill and validate high-quality blast holes, while using significantly less energy. iRing said: “Boart Longyear’s drills utilise drilling data logging to interpret rock density and strength etc, while drilling.”

The company continued: “With Seneca’s help, Nexco will build a demonstration plant that will produce an energy-variable explosive mixture that can be fuelled while being loaded into the blastholes, and the blast energy would be based on the ore strength information provided by Boart Longyear’s drills and iRing’s software.”

Troy Williams, Vice President of Development of iRing, said: “The challenge will provide a once-in-a-life-time opportunity to reach the mining industry and demonstrate that it is possible to produce consistent results from the blasting operations.”

PEL will design and fabricate the explosive manufacturing and loading equipment required to change the explosive’s energy during loading, according to iRing. Energy reduction is done by adding additional water content into the explosive formulation during loading. Maptek’s laser scanner, meanwhile, will be used to verify fragmentation results by scanning the muck pile and producing a 3D point cloud which can be analysed for a measured fragmentation distribution. Those results will be used by Aegis to further calibrate the fragmentation models.

Mark Sherry, President of iRing, said: “We are really excited by this opportunity as it is directly in iRing’s wheelhouse. The Paradigm Shifters bring together the best in the industry when it comes to drilling and blasting. By working together, we will create a paradigm that is more efficient, effective, cleaner, and safer”.