Excavation and transportation in surface coal mining - the recent past and near future

Abstract

Approximately 50 to 60% of the total operating cost in a surface mine is consumed in the excavation and transportation of the mined mineral, consequently, incentive to reduce cost in this area remains high. Although the use of traditional equipment such as shovel/trucks, draglines, front-end loaders and scrapers is the mainstay of surface mining, the coal industry is now beginning to consider equipment and techniques from non-coal surface mining operations. Mobile equipment has found new applications as it required lower initial capital investments. This paper reviews some of the equipment and systems developed over the past few years. These relate to the application of hydraulic shovels, bucket wheels, belt conveyors, high angle and cross pit conveyors and off-highway trucks. Some combination systems e.g. bucket wheel excavators, draglines, and hydraulic shovels loading either into trucks or hoppers discharging on to various types of conveyor systems have reached a remarkable degree of sophistication in application contributing to lower cost and improvement in reclamation due to its selective mining and placement capability. As a general trend conveyors and conveyor related systems are finding greater acceptance due to their lower operating costs.