Comparison of beaching slopes from two centrally discharging tailings storage facilities

Addis, Philip; Cunningham, Erick

doi:10.36487/acg_rep/1063_22_addis

Cited by 3 publications

(4 citation statements)

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“…At a density of around 70% solids, the tailings slurry essentially behaved as thickened slurry with no measurable yield stress as shown in Figure 4. A review of literature indicated that the proposed tailings density is higher than the Kidd Metallurgical Site at 61% (Kam et al, 2009) and an unnamed operation in South Africa at 53-55% (Addis and Cunningham, 2010). Both of these facilities produced non-segregating tailings with relatively steep beach slopes.…”

Section: Laboratory Testingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Thickened tailings disposal at Musselwhite Mine

Kam¹,

Girard²,

Hmidi³

et al. 2011

Proceedings of the 14th International Seminar on Paste and Thickened Tailings

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Musselwhite Mine in Northwestern Ontario, Canada began thickened tailings disposal in May 2010. Surface disposal of thickened tailings for the 4,000 tpd gold mine was chosen following a series of studies beginning in 2002 to investigate options to expand the capacity of the tailings management area. This technology was considered most cost effective in maximising storage capacity within the existing site footprint. The elimination of a pond for closure will reduce the risk of dam failure. Further, the non-segregating tailings are expected to be relatively impervious and saturated. These characteristics will help inhibit tailings oxidation and reduce the likelihood of acid generating and metals leaching in the long term. Musselwhite Mine is currently planning to remove the sulphide minerals from the tailings stream using a flotation plant. This paper discusses the design of the thickened tailings disposal system and presents preliminary observations on tailings deposition to date. In preparation for thickened tailings disposal the tailings management area was partitioned by an internal dyke in 2008. This has allowed tailings to be 'stacked' using the upstream method of construction in the west cell and the east cell to serve as a water management pond. The cold climate presents a special challenge to operating the thickened tailings system as there is very little precedent experience. The design has incorporated a number of contingency measures to facilitate tailings thickening and deposition in winter. Field data have suggested that the thickened tailings system is performing very well to date. The thickening plant has consistently produced underflow at about 70% solids with minimal attention. The tailings beaches are steeper than expected. The deposited tailings are non-segregating and relatively saturated. The measured in situ dry density of the tailings is higher than expected. The performance of tailings deposition is being closely monitored.

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Section: Laboratory Testingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Thickened tailings disposal at Musselwhite Mine

Kam¹,

Girard²,

Hmidi³

et al. 2011

Proceedings of the 14th International Seminar on Paste and Thickened Tailings

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“…Here Equation 2 is fit to the full-scale profile from the Bulyanhulu mine site reported by Addis & Cunningham (2010). The data presented up to this point in the paper suggests that the upward LT profile begins to better describe the overall shape of the tailings as deposits develop.…”

Section: Gold Tailings -Fully Developed Field Profilementioning

confidence: 94%

“…Equations 2 and 3 are applied to the full-scale Bulyanhulu data in Figure 7. The data is from Addis & Cunningham (2010) and is also reported in Simms et al (2011). Equation 2provides a best fit for a yield stress of 14 kPa, and Equation 3 for a yield stress of 4 kPa.…”

Section: Gold Tailings -Fully Developed Field Profilementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Other recent examples are Wenberg et al (2020 ) at -3%; Pirouz et al (2015), who found a 1.5% beach slope for a large pilot trial but for a yield stress of ~10 Pa; and Ruhanen et al (2018), who found a high beach slope for a pilot paste plant (~6%). Similar sites show depression of the beach slope as the scale of the deposit decreases (for example, Addis & Cunningham (2010)).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Rheology for deposition control and deposit failure risk analysis

Simms¹,

Xia²,

Patel³

et al. 2023

Paste 2023: 25th International Conference on Paste, Thickened and Filtered Tailings

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Application of rheology to the post-deposition behaviour of tailings is important for the design of the slope of the impoundment, control of layering for purposes of strength enhancement through desiccation, properly describing the mixing of different tailings streams and for dam breach consequence analysis. This paper aims to advance the understanding of tailings rheology in the post-deposition context to aid all of these applications. Firstly, thixotropy and its quantitative implications for beach slope and layer geometry are explored using a simple treatment. Secondly, method dependency in yield stress measurement is discussed, along with how such uncertainty can be practically handled by considering the appropriate stress path and timescale for a particular application. Finally, numerical simulation using a thixotropic rheology of channel flow down a beach and runout from a dam breach experiment, conducted in a centrifuge, is used to highlight the utility of advanced rheology to such problems. The paper uses data collected from published work on both hard rock and oil sands tailings over the last 15 years.

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Duty of care applied to tailings operations

Boswell¹,

Sobkowicz²

2011

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Comparison of beaching slopes from two centrally discharging tailings storage facilities

Cited by 3 publications

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Thickened tailings disposal at Musselwhite Mine

Thickened tailings disposal at Musselwhite Mine

Rheology for deposition control and deposit failure risk analysis

Duty of care applied to tailings operations

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