Abstract
Heat damage in deep mines is severe and can lead to adverse health effects. The existing refrigeration schemes for the heading face in excavation roadways aim to cool the whole cooling region. However, the ratio of the area occupied by workers to that of the cooling region is quite small. A great quantity of energy for refrigeration is doomed to waste. In this study, a new cooling strategy for building a non-uniform environment in the heading face was developed. A certain quantity of well-designed tracking air coolers were distributed in the excavation roadway near the heading face. The air cooler tracked the constantly moving workers and blew cold air to them. Economic analysis based on estimation of the cooling load for this cooling strategy was conducted. The airflow in the excavation roadway was numerically simulated to estimate the cooling effect. An average energy saving of approximately 30% could be realized. The thermal environment for the workers whether near the heading face or in the roadway improved. This cooling strategy should be considered in all of mine cooling.
Highlights
Fossil-fuel energy, which accounts for 87% of the market share, still dominates as the leading role of the world’s energy consumption structure [1]
This study only considered the following assumptions were adopted: general case, and the following assumptions were adopted: All the workers are located near the heading face of theofexcavation roadway
Four tracking air coolers were equidistantly distributed on one side roadway to improve the thermal environment for the workers in the cooling region
Summary
Fossil-fuel energy, which accounts for 87% of the market share, still dominates as the leading role of the world’s energy consumption structure [1]. When the heat damage is serious enough, ventilation cannot significantly lower the airflow temperature, and artificial refrigeration should be adopted [18]. The air cooler is one of the most common terminal units in the mine, whose layout and operating parameters can significantly affect the cooling effect of the mechanical refrigeration system. Taking the forced ventilation as an example, there are two there are two schemes for cooling the heading face, as shown in Figure 1 [25]. The first cooling scheme involves an scheme involves an air cooler installed after the local fan in the roadway. The cold airflow air cooler installed after the local fan in the roadway. To obtain a better between the effect, airflow and heat cooling sources.scheme. Than quarter of the energy for mining was consumed by the mine cooling [1,27]
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