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a b s t r a c tA survey of the comminution energy requirements of gold and copper producing mines has been conducted to provide reliable benchmarking data which can be used to compare comminution energy consumption across different mine sites. The total gold and copper production of the mines included in the study equated to 15% and 24% respectively of global production and all of Australian production. The comminution energy per unit metal product has been presented in a graphical form similar to a cost curve. This simple technique allows individual mines to be ranked with respect to energy consumption and clearly displays the potential energy and cost benefits of moving down the graph into more efficient operating regimes. Assuming similar specific energy requirements for other sites, comminution of gold and copper ores can be expected to consume about 0.2% of global, and 1.3% of Australia's electricity consumption. Efforts to reduce this figure should be aimed at the top third of consumers as they are responsible for 80% of the total consumption. Analysis of the contribution of circuit efficiency, ore competence, grind size and ore grade showed that ore grade was the greatest determinate of specific comminution energy. Therefore, concentrating the ore via gangue rejection or grade engineering prior to grinding is likely to achieve the largest positive effect on comminution energy efficiency.

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Please cite this article as: Narasimha, M., Mainza, A.N., Holtham, P.N., Powell, M.S., Brennan, M.S., A semi-mechanistic model of hydrocyclones -developed from industrial data and inputs from CFD, International Journal of Mineral Processing (2014), doi: 10.1016/j.minpro.2014 This is a PDF file of an unedited manuscript that has been accepted for publication. As a service to our customers we are providing this early version of the manuscript. The manuscript will undergo copyediting, typesetting, and review of the resulting proof before it is published in its final form. Please note that during the production process errors may be discovered which could affect the content, and all legal disclaimers that apply to the journal pertain. A C C E P T E D M A N U S C R I P T ABSTRACTThe flow behavior in hydrocyclones is extremely complex, leading the designers to rely on empirical equations for predicting cyclone performance. A number of classifying cyclone models have been developed and used in mineral comminution circuit simulators in the past. The problem with these empirical cyclone models is that they cannot be used outside the range of conditions under which they were developed. A semi-mechanistic hydrocyclone model is developed using the dimensionless approach based on both the fluid mechanics concepts from

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