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Optimizing Hydrocyclone Separation Processes

Jim Cahill — Mon, 29 Apr 2019 14:06:00 GMT

Diagram of a hydrocyclone:
1. the liquid-solid mixture enters,
2. heavy solids leave,
3. cleaned liquid leaves.
Photo credit: “hydrocyclone” by VanBuren is licensed under CC BY 3.0

In the mining industry, hydrocyclones are mineral processing equipment used in slurry pulps to separate coarse and fine particles according to their size and density. From Wikipedia:

The mixture [slurry pulp] is injected into the hydrocyclone in such a way as to create the vortex and, depending upon the relative densities of the two phases, the centrifugal acceleration will cause the dispersed phase to move away from or towards the central core of the vortex.

Coarse particles exit the bottom of the device (underflow) while fine particles are carried by the central air column and exit at the top (overflow). In metal processing applications, the product stream is the overflow (fine particles) and is typically sent to flotation circuits. In coal and iron processing, the product stream is the underflow (coarse particles), as fines are separated from the final product as a means of quality control.

Cristián Doerr

I connected with Emerson’s Cristián Doerr in the Mining Center of Excellence about Hydrocyclone Optimizer technology to improve separation efficiency and increase reliability.

Cristián noted that under certain conditions roping and plugging can occur where the hydrocyclones ceases to classify the particles. The shapes of the discharge are visibly different than normal operating conditions.

The roping condition occurs when the amount of solids in the underflow increases to such a point that its discharge velocity is limited, resulting in the accumulation of coarse solids in the separation chamber. This mass passes through the vortex, causing the inner air core to collapse and the discharge at the apex to take the form of a solid stream (rope) consisting of coarse material with high solids density. Roping conditions reduce recovery rates and efficiency in metals processing and lead to quality losses in coal & iron processing.

If not corrected in time the flow may clog and stop—a plugging condition which can result in contamination and downstream processing efficiency losses. Plugging occurs when the bottom aperture completely plugs forcing the materials overhead. In metals processing applications plugging reduces recovery efficiency, can cause flotation cell damage and reduce overall availability in order to clean the flotation cells. For coal and iron processing, similarly recovery efficiency is affected along with possible damage to the hydrocyclones and downstream equipment.

To avoid these conditions and operate productively and reliably, the Mining Center of Excellence team developed Hydrocyclone Optimizer technology. This control & optimization application addresses the problems associated with roping, plugging and undesired particle classification. It characterizes the different operating parameters of each cyclone. Having this information per cyclone allows the execution of efficient control strategies.

When the information is only per battery, you are not able to see which are the poor performing cyclones in a battery, based on particle size distribution, mass flows and densities of solids in the pulps transferred by the vortex and apex, in addition to their circulating loads. The application displays this information in real-time to the plant operator.

The solution uses two non-invasive, externally-mounted vibration sensors on each cyclone of a classification battery with the wired sensors placed in the vortex and apex areas and transmit the energy signals generated by the process. These vibration signals are processed first in a multi-channel Emerson AMS 6500 machinery health monitor and then in an expert system that resides either in a DeltaV Ethernet I/O card (EIOC) or a DeltaV PK Controller where roping and plugging conditions can be accurately identified.

In addition to the vibration characteristics, the expert system also incorporates key process variables from the plant’s PI historian (expert system also pull data out from plant existing PLC or DCS) and provides real-time particle size distribution data to the operator.

This solution helps reduce process downtime, increase recovery, avoid quality penalties, improve production efficiency, and lower operations costs by providing early recognition of misclassification conditions.

Visit the Mining, Minerals & Metals section on Emerson.com or share your contact information to connect with an expert. You can also connect and interact with other mining industry experts in the Metals & Mining group in the Emerson Exchange 365 community.

The post Optimizing Hydrocyclone Separation Processes appeared first on the Emerson Automation Experts blog.

Automating and Optimizing Copper Heap Leaching Processes

Jim Cahill — Fri, 09 Nov 2018 18:55:57 GMT

Our world is dependent on all the copper wire distributing electricity and communications signals over great distances and throughout our homes and businesses. Mining and refining this copper into the purity required poses safety, efficiency and reliability challenges for global miners.

I learned quite a bit about the mining process and its challenges from Emerson’s Alena Johnson excellent Mining Engineering magazine article, Improved flow measurement and control are key to efficiency.

Alena opens describing the heap leaching process for copper:

Copper ore is excavated from the ground, crushed and then spread in uniform layers on a pad. A slow trickle of sulfuric acid is distributed over the pile, where it percolates to the bottom and a collection point. The acid leaches out the copper, along with other minerals, which can be extracted chemically.

This continuous process is performed on a massive scale:

A typical pad measures 1.6-km (1-mile) long and 0.8-km (0.5-miles) wide. Working day after day, the stacker creates individual piles or modules on the pad, each 122 x 61 m (400 by 200 ft) and 3 m (10 ft) deep. When one module is filled, it moves across the pad to the next, filling the area in one continuous pile.

Much like a drip irrigation system for a garden, mining technicians lay plastic pipes on the surface. Dripping out of this network of pipes is:

…diluted sulfuric acid, called raffinate, is pumped through the pipes so it can be distributed over the module, allowing the acid to soak through the ore and leach out copper as it percolates to the bottom.

Monitoring the even flow of raffinate, which is critical for efficient extraction of copper from the ore, has been a manual operation since everything on the surface is moved around manually.

If it hits one area heavily, it will quickly leach out the copper, and then the rest of the raffinate will simply sink and be wasted on the layers of spent calcite. Eventually this flooding causes porosity and destabilizes the pile. Other areas with inadequate coverage will leave behind unrecovered copper. Hitting some average value where there are still highs and lows does not help.

One miner turned to the Emerson team for a solution to improve the overall efficiency of this leaching process. They needed movable, modular skids that two technicians could lift and move around on all-terrain vehicles. The skids would measure and control the flow of raffinate. Since they were movable, a wireless DP flow meter, wireless pressure transmitter and manual regulating valve were needed per skid.

Once a solution was developed and tested, the skids were built and deployed. Part of the planning process was the miner’s recognition that:

…its biggest product had become data. With every unit sending its reports, there were more than 1.2 million data points created daily.

This wealth of big data provided the opportunity for analysis and optimization. They:

…created a quality score system based on an ideal pressure target using very strict performance expectations. A deviation of 0.05 psi from the ideal value at the skid causes a 1 percent score deduction. With so tight a measure, the plant thought it would be an accomplishment to run at better than 80 percent across the site. After using the new system for a few months, they routinely scored higher than 87 percent.

Read the article for more on the heap leaching process, requirements for the skids, skid solution, improvements made from access to the real-time and historical data, and how this digital transformation lead to improved operations. You can also connect and interact with other mining and flow measurement experts in the Metals & Mining and Measurement Instrumentation groups in the Emerson Exchange 365 community.

The post Automating and Optimizing Copper Heap Leaching Processes appeared first on the Emerson Automation Experts blog.

Automating and Optimizing Copper Heap Leaching Processes

Jim Cahill — Fri, 09 Nov 2018 18:55:57 GMT

Alena opens describing the heap leaching process for copper:

Copper ore is excavated from the ground, crushed and then spread in uniform layers on a pad. A slow trickle of sulfuric acid is distributed over the pile, where it percolates to the bottom and a collection point. The acid leaches out the copper, along with other minerals, which can be extracted chemically.

This continuous process is performed on a massive scale:

A typical pad measures 1.6-km (1-mile) long and 0.8-km (0.5-miles) wide. Working day after day, the stacker creates individual piles or modules on the pad, each 122 x 61 m (400 by 200 ft) and 3 m (10 ft) deep. When one module is filled, it moves across the pad to the next, filling the area in one continuous pile.

Much like a drip irrigation system for a garden, mining technicians lay plastic pipes on the surface. Dripping out of this network of pipes is:

…diluted sulfuric acid, called raffinate, is pumped through the pipes so it can be distributed over the module, allowing the acid to soak through the ore and leach out copper as it percolates to the bottom.

Monitoring the even flow of raffinate, which is critical for efficient extraction of copper from the ore, has been a manual operation since everything on the surface is moved around manually.

If it hits one area heavily, it will quickly leach out the copper, and then the rest of the raffinate will simply sink and be wasted on the layers of spent calcite. Eventually this flooding causes porosity and destabilizes the pile. Other areas with inadequate coverage will leave behind unrecovered copper. Hitting some average value where there are still highs and lows does not help.

Once a solution was developed and tested, the skids were built and deployed. Part of the planning process was the miner’s recognition that:

…its biggest product had become data. With every unit sending its reports, there were more than 1.2 million data points created daily.

This wealth of big data provided the opportunity for analysis and optimization. They:

…created a quality score system based on an ideal pressure target using very strict performance expectations. A deviation of 0.05 psi from the ideal value at the skid causes a 1 percent score deduction. With so tight a measure, the plant thought it would be an accomplishment to run at better than 80 percent across the site. After using the new system for a few months, they routinely scored higher than 87 percent.

The post Automating and Optimizing Copper Heap Leaching Processes appeared first on the Emerson Automation Experts blog.

Quantifying the Resource Efficiency of the Global Steel Sector: Why is Our Metric Better?

Jim Cahill — Mon, 17 Sep 2018 21:36:37 GMT

Author: Ana Gonzalez Hernandez

In my last post, I introduced Emerson’s new resource efficiency approach. With it, Emerson proposes a new way of thinking about resource efficiency. One that encapsulates many aspects of modern industry solutions: we leverage the value residing in available metered data, communicate key knowledge through powerful digital visuals, and do so by tracking more a holistic metric – be it continuously or as part of corporate strategic exercises.

In this blog post, I now briefly describe how we applied this resource efficiency approach to analyse the improvement opportunities available in the steel industry worldwide. More details on the method used and the results obtained can be found in this ScienceDirect article; this is the article that this post is based on.

The global steel industry: ripe for change

Strong, durable and formable, steel is the dominant engineering and construction material in our modern economy. Ranking among the five most energy-intensive industrial processes, the production of steel alone consumes about 6% of the global final energy use and generates about 7% of global energy-related CO₂ emissions. This equates to over half of the total energy consumed in the European Union in 2016. Future projections do not bode any better: forecast increases in wealth and population are predicted to at least double the demand for steel (and that of other metals) by 2050.

As a result, the steel sector is expected to contribute with its fair share of energy and emission reductions in upcoming years. This, while remaining competitive in a market beset with chronic volatility and overcapacity – McKinsey reckons that “in today’s economic environment, most players can hardly finance any innovation capex, or develop their asset base”. In some countries, these global market conditions have resulted in the need for state interventions to prevent the closure of inefficient plants.

How resource-efficient is the steel industry worldwide?

The slow deployment of disruptive decarbonisation technologies, such as smelt-reduction and carbon capture and storage, has made improvements in the industry’s resource efficiency imperative. For this reason, Emerson and the resource efficiency collective in Cambridge partnered up with worldsteel (the global steel association) to study the sector’s scope for resource efficiency improvements. Worldsteel represents over 85% of steel production globally. This includes 160 steel producers, as well as national steel industry associations. The association also compiles the most comprehensive data on the industry’s operational performance.

In this study, we used resource data compiled by worldsteel through a series of company surveys over a four-year period between 2010 and 2014. We analyse energy and material flow data from 38 steel sites; these represent 9% of the global crude steel production in 2010 and cover the regions of: Europe, China, India, North and South America, the Middle East and the Commonwealth of Independent States. This data covers two primary routes – the blast furnace-basic oxygen steelmaking route (BF-BOS) and the direct reduction-electric arc furnace (DRI-EAF) – and one secondary route: the scrap-based electric arc furnace (EAF)1. Figure 1 shows the processes involved in each of the three routes.

Figure 1- Three steel production routes covered by our resource efficiency analysis. The icons in this figure belong to worldsteel and have been used here with their permission.

We track material and energy flows using Sankey diagrams; here the thickness of each line represents the scale of resource flow, in units of exergy (see Figure 2). Every node represents a process plant and colour is used to distinguish between different resource types. The resulting map reveals the complex interactions between energy and materials in the energy-intensive industry of steelmaking. Presenting our results in this form allows the scale of resource streams to be contextualised, providing a powerful way to highlight and prioritise improvement opportunities. The total resource input to the steel industry in 2010 is 24.7 GJ/tcs (gigajoules of exergy per tonne of crude steel). The BF-BOS route has an average resource input of 29.8 GJ/tcs, whereas the DRI-EAF and the scrap-only EAF routes have values of 17.2 and 10.3 GJ/tcs respectively.

Figure 2- Resource flows in the steel sector in 2010; measured in units of energy. Coke oven (CO), sinter (SI), blast furnace (BF), basic oxygen steelmaking (BOS), direct-reduction ironmaking (DRI), electric arc furnace (EAF), hot strip mill (HSM), tonnes of crude steel (tcs). These values assume final energy numbers for electricity, i.e. not including the energy used to produce this. This image was obtained from here.

Results obtained from our method reveal that the sector is 32.9% resource-efficient and that secondary steelmaking is twice as efficient (65.7%) as ore-based production (29.1%) – see Figure 3. In the short- to medium-term, the sector has two promising paths of action to improve its resource efficiency.

Figure 3- Resource efficiency distributions for the three production routes. Image obtained from here.

First, the steel sector has the option to improve its average operational performance. There continues to be scope for shifting average primary production plants to best practice – these improvements are possible primarily because of the technological heterogeneity that exists across sites. Together, the BF-BOS and the DRI-EAF routes can save up to a quarter of the sector’s yearly resource inputs (measured in units of exergy), with almost two thirds of these savings arising solely from the BF-BOS route. Under aggressive assumptions, namely fully preventing off-gas flaring, recovering material yield losses, and utilising the available material by-products (sludge and slag), the sector’s resource efficiency can increase from 33% to above 40%; recovering all wasted heat pushes this up to 45%.

Second, the sector can increase its use of end-of-life scrap. This will require restructuring. Notwithstanding limitations on scrap availability, capacity to improve scrap use exists in all three production routes: blast furnace-basic oxygen steelmaking (BF-BOS) route, direct reduction-electric arc furnace route (DRI-EAF), and scrap-based electric arc furnaces (scrap EAF). The largest savings are available from increasing the share of steel produced through scrap-only electric furnaces. The alternative is for BF-BOS production – the most energy-intensive route –to shift to DRI-EAF. Despite not being as resource-efficient as scrap-based plants (∼41% versus ∼66%), the DRI-EAF route is, on average, more efficient than ore-based routes (∼29%).

It is uncertain what the steel sector of the future will look like. Steel producers need to decide how far they are willing to reduce their virgin ore production: whether only a little (by improving the BF-BOS plants), a moderate amount (by shifting to DRI-EAF) or all the way (by shifting to scrap EAF). What is clear is that the current fragmented steel sector is ripe for operational improvements and restructuring, especially if companies want to remain profitable in the face of stricter environmental regulations.

Why is this approach better than conventional ones?

Our proposed approach constitutes an important step towards understanding the interactions of resource flows and plant efficiencies in industry. It is therefore a meaningful tool for industry and policymakers to track and benchmark the resource efficiency of the steel sector. Unlike conventional efficiency studies, which are often limited to analyses on energy flows, our metric can:

widen the portfolio of efficiency improvements analysed. By quantifying the energy as well material flows used, our metric promotes the adoption of energy and material efficiency– both of which save energy and emissions. This is particularly promising as a way of incentivising the recovery of material by-products, which is currently often neglected in all other performance metrics.
appraise the quality of resource flows. Our approach goes beyond quantifying the energy and mass of resources and also considers their temperature, pressure and composition. This helps us determine which resource streams we should focus on. In doing so, we believe we can better align environmental stewardship with profitability objectives.
reveal the resource losses generated in real processes. This is possible because our thermodynamic-based metric captures both the First and Second Laws of Thermodynamics. Understanding the scale and structure of irreversibilities can guide efforts to improve technology designs.
compare performance across different types of processes as a result of its dimensionless nature, i.e. it ranges between 0 and 100. This is not the case with energy intensity metrics, which measure the ratio of joules to kilograms for individual systems.

From Jim: You can connect and interact with Ana and other resource efficiency experts at the October 1-5 Emerson Exchange conference in San Antonio, Texas.

1 Currently, about 69% of global crude steel is produced via the BF-BOS route, whereas approximately 29% is produced through electric furnaces (a mix of directly reduced iron and scrap-based routes).

The post Quantifying the Resource Efficiency of the Global Steel Sector: Why is Our Metric Better? appeared first on the Emerson Automation Experts blog.

Quantifying the Resource Efficiency of the Global Steel Sector: Why is Our Metric Better?

Jim Cahill — Mon, 17 Sep 2018 21:36:37 GMT

Author: Ana Gonzalez Hernandez

The global steel industry: ripe for change

How resource-efficient is the steel industry worldwide?

In this study, we used resource data compiled by worldsteel through a series of company surveys over a four-year period between 2010 and 2014. We analyse energy and material flow data from 38 steel sites; these represent 9% of the global crude steel production in 2010 and cover the regions of: Europe, China, India, North and South America, the Middle East and the Commonwealth of Independent States. This data covers two primary routes – the blast furnace-basic oxygen steelmaking route (BF-BOS) and the direct reduction-electric arc furnace (DRI-EAF) – and one secondary route: the scrap-based electric arc furnace (EAF). Figure 1 shows the processes involved in each of the three routes.

Figure 1- Resource flows in the steel sector in 2010; measured in units of energy. Coke oven (CO), sinter (SI), blast furnace (BF), basic oxygen steelmaking (BOS), direct-reduction ironmaking (DRI), electric arc furnace (EAF), hot strip mill (HSM), tonnes of crude steel (tcs). These values assume final energy numbers for electricity, i.e. not including the energy used to produce this. This image was obtained from here.

Figure 2- Three steel production routes covered by our resource efficiency analysis. The icons in this figure belong to worldsteel and have been used here with their permission.

Figure 3- Resource efficiency distributions for the three production routes. Image obtained from here.

Why is this approach better than conventional ones?

widen the portfolio of efficiency improvements analysed. By quantifying the energy as well material flows used, our metric promotes the adoption of energy and material efficiency– both of which save energy and emissions. This is particularly promising as a way of incentivising the recovery of material by-products, which is currently often neglected in all other performance metrics.
appraise the quality of resource flows. Our approach goes beyond quantifying the energy and mass of resources and also considers their temperature, pressure and composition. This helps us determine which resource streams we should focus on. In doing so, we believe we can better align environmental stewardship with profitability objectives.
reveal the resource losses generated in real processes. This is possible because our thermodynamic-based metric captures both the First and Second Laws of Thermodynamics. Understanding the scale and structure of irreversibilities can guide efforts to improve technology designs.
compare performance across different types of processes as a result of its dimensionless nature, i.e. it ranges between 0 and 100. This is not the case with energy intensity metrics, which measure the ratio of joules to kilograms for individual systems.

From Jim: You can connect and interact with Ana and other resource efficiency experts at the October 1-5 Emerson Exchange conference in San Antonio, Texas.

The post Quantifying the Resource Efficiency of the Global Steel Sector: Why is Our Metric Better? appeared first on the Emerson Automation Experts blog.

Isolation Knife Gate Valve for Medium-Slurry Mining and Minerals Applications

Jim Cahill — Mon, 02 Apr 2018 19:54:06 GMT

Many manufacturing processes have challenging fluids flowing through their pipes and vessels. Mining and minerals have some of the most challenging with abrasive and corrosive solids in the flowing fluids.

In a Valve magazine article, Challenges of Medium Density Slurry Service in Mining and Mineral Processing, Emerson’s Mike Gordon describes innovations in knife gate valve technology to address these slurries.

Mike opens defining medium density slurries:

…applications where solids sized between 5 to 1,000 microns are present in the fluid medium and percent solids range from 5 to 20% by weight…

Traditional valve choices were between:

…an economic light-service valve that, in medium-slurry applications, will require frequent replacement, or a heavy-duty valve that is over-specified and expensive.

Clarkson SU10R Polyurethane Knife Gate Valve

The design for an isolation knife gate valve for medium-slurry applications, found in coal, gold, silver, copper, uranium mining, and more, has:

…a higher thrust requirement due to the friction that occurs because of the gate sliding on the internal urethane during opening and closing cycles. If not designed correctly, gates will tend to deflect and potentially damage the liner on the downstream side along the bottom edge as pressure on the gate increases when the valve is nearing closed position… will not trade-off isolation, thrust and liner life in accounting for gate deflection.

Mike highlighted the innovation of:

…a two-piece body construction and field-replaceable snap-in liner design that represents a new type of knife gate valve. No special tools or highly trained personnel are needed to replace the liner. An integral seat-face seal eliminates the need for flange gaskets, reducing installation costs and making installation easier.

He shares a case study of a global coal producer in an Australian coal preparation plant, where:

…stainless cyclone feed knife gate valves were being destroyed prematurely by abrasive coal fines and were failing in less than 12 months.

Read the article for how this isolation knife gate valve for medium slurries reduced maintenance costs and improved overall performance for the production process. Visit the medium-slurry processing case study on this Australian mine as well.

You can connect and interact with other valve and mining experts in the Valves and Metals & Mining groups in the Emerson Exchange 365 community.

The post Isolation Knife Gate Valve for Medium-Slurry Mining and Minerals Applications appeared first on the Emerson Automation Experts blog.

Isolation Knife Gate Valve for Medium-Slurry Mining and Minerals Applications

Jim Cahill — Mon, 02 Apr 2018 19:54:06 GMT

Mike opens defining medium density slurries:

…applications where solids sized between 5 to 1,000 microns are present in the fluid medium and percent solids range from 5 to 20% by weight…

Traditional valve choices were between:

…an economic light-service valve that, in medium-slurry applications, will require frequent replacement, or a heavy-duty valve that is over-specified and expensive.

Clarkson SU10R Polyurethane Knife Gate Valve

The design for an isolation knife gate valve for medium-slurry applications, found in coal, gold, silver, copper, uranium mining, and more, has:

…a higher thrust requirement due to the friction that occurs because of the gate sliding on the internal urethane during opening and closing cycles. If not designed correctly, gates will tend to deflect and potentially damage the liner on the downstream side along the bottom edge as pressure on the gate increases when the valve is nearing closed position… will not trade-off isolation, thrust and liner life in accounting for gate deflection.

Mike highlighted the innovation of:

…a two-piece body construction and field-replaceable snap-in liner design that represents a new type of knife gate valve. No special tools or highly trained personnel are needed to replace the liner. An integral seat-face seal eliminates the need for flange gaskets, reducing installation costs and making installation easier.

He shares a case study of a global coal producer in an Australian coal preparation plant, where:

…stainless cyclone feed knife gate valves were being destroyed prematurely by abrasive coal fines and were failing in less than 12 months.

You can connect and interact with other valve and mining experts in the Valves and Metals & Mining groups in the Emerson Exchange 365 community.

The post Isolation Knife Gate Valve for Medium-Slurry Mining and Minerals Applications appeared first on the Emerson Automation Experts blog.

Isolation Knife Gate Valve for Medium-Slurry Mining and Minerals Applications

Jim Cahill — Mon, 02 Apr 2018 19:54:06 GMT

Mike opens defining medium density slurries:

…applications where solids sized between 5 to 1,000 microns are present in the fluid medium and percent solids range from 5 to 20% by weight…

Traditional valve choices were between:

…an economic light-service valve that, in medium-slurry applications, will require frequent replacement, or a heavy-duty valve that is over-specified and expensive.

Clarkson SU10R Polyurethane Knife Gate Valve

The design for an isolation knife gate valve for medium-slurry applications, found in coal, gold, silver, copper, uranium mining, and more, has:

…a higher thrust requirement due to the friction that occurs because of the gate sliding on the internal urethane during opening and closing cycles. If not designed correctly, gates will tend to deflect and potentially damage the liner on the downstream side along the bottom edge as pressure on the gate increases when the valve is nearing closed position… will not trade-off isolation, thrust and liner life in accounting for gate deflection.

Mike highlighted the innovation of:

…a two-piece body construction and field-replaceable snap-in liner design that represents a new type of knife gate valve. No special tools or highly trained personnel are needed to replace the liner. An integral seat-face seal eliminates the need for flange gaskets, reducing installation costs and making installation easier.

He shares a case study of a global coal producer in an Australian coal preparation plant, where:

…stainless cyclone feed knife gate valves were being destroyed prematurely by abrasive coal fines and were failing in less than 12 months.

You can connect and interact with other valve and mining experts in the Valves and Metals & Mining groups in the Emerson Exchange 365 community.

The post Isolation Knife Gate Valve for Medium-Slurry Mining and Minerals Applications appeared first on the Emerson Automation Experts blog.

Isolation Knife Gate Valve for Medium-Slurry Mining and Minerals Applications

Jim Cahill — Mon, 02 Apr 2018 19:54:06 GMT

Mike opens defining medium density slurries:

…applications where solids sized between 5 to 1,000 microns are present in the fluid medium and percent solids range from 5 to 20% by weight…

Traditional valve choices were between:

…an economic light-service valve that, in medium-slurry applications, will require frequent replacement, or a heavy-duty valve that is over-specified and expensive.

Clarkson SU10R Polyurethane Knife Gate Valve

The design for an isolation knife gate valve for medium-slurry applications, found in coal, gold, silver, copper, uranium mining, and more, has:

…a higher thrust requirement due to the friction that occurs because of the gate sliding on the internal urethane during opening and closing cycles. If not designed correctly, gates will tend to deflect and potentially damage the liner on the downstream side along the bottom edge as pressure on the gate increases when the valve is nearing closed position… will not trade-off isolation, thrust and liner life in accounting for gate deflection.

Mike highlighted the innovation of:

…a two-piece body construction and field-replaceable snap-in liner design that represents a new type of knife gate valve. No special tools or highly trained personnel are needed to replace the liner. An integral seat-face seal eliminates the need for flange gaskets, reducing installation costs and making installation easier.

He shares a case study of a global coal producer in an Australian coal preparation plant, where:

…stainless cyclone feed knife gate valves were being destroyed prematurely by abrasive coal fines and were failing in less than 12 months.

You can connect and interact with other valve and mining experts in the Valves and Metals & Mining groups in the Emerson Exchange 365 community.

The post Isolation Knife Gate Valve for Medium-Slurry Mining and Minerals Applications appeared first on the Emerson Automation Experts blog.

China Sneezed and the Mining Industry Caught Pneumonia

Jim Cahill — Tue, 19 Jan 2016 20:45:28 GMT

Author: Alan Novak

As noted in a recent Financial Post article, the world’s largest mining companies have fallen on hard times. Since 2011, global mining stocks have lost $1.4 trillion in value; more than the value of Apple, Exxon Mobil and Google combined. A few charts of the underlying commodities and related company stocks show just how bad it has been.

Global copper price:

Source: InfoMine – 5 Year Copper Prices and Price Charts

Freeport McMoRan stock:

Source: Google Finance

Iron Ore Price:

Source: InfoMine – 5 Year Iron Ore Fines Prices and Price Charts

BHP Billiton stock:

Source: Google Finance

So what caused the decline? A combination of factors. Slowing growth and softening demand from the world’s largest metals consumer, China, combined with an abundance of supply coming on line from “supermine” projects that were initiated during the commodities boom. Since 2007 mining companies have spent over $100 billion per year on projects such as Rio Tinto’s Oyu Tolgoi copper and gold mine in Mongolia, Freeport’s Cerro Verde copper mine in Peru and Anglo American’s Minas Rio iron ore mine in Brazil which bring millions of tons of supply into an already weak market. Cerro Verde alone is expected to produce up to 1 billion pounds of copper per year (about 3% of the global total).

From a recent Wall Street Journal article, Supermines add to Supply Glut of Metals [subscription required]:

Those giant mines are now giving the industry an extra-bad hangover during the bust. The big mines cost so much to build and extract minerals so efficiently that mothballing them is unthinkable—running them generates cash to pay down debts, and huge mines are expensive to simply maintain while idle. But as a result, their scale means they are helping miners dig themselves even deeper into the price trough by adding to a glut.

How long will it take the mining industry to work through this period of oversupply? Only time will tell.

The post China Sneezed and the Mining Industry Caught Pneumonia appeared first on the Emerson Automation Experts blog.

China Sneezed and the Mining Industry Caught Pneumonia

Jim Cahill — Tue, 19 Jan 2016 20:45:28 GMT

Author: Alan Novak

Global copper price:

Source: InfoMine – 5 Year Copper Prices and Price Charts

Freeport McMoRan stock:

Source: Google Finance

Iron Ore Price:

Source: InfoMine – 5 Year Iron Ore Fines Prices and Price Charts

BHP Billiton stock:

Source: Google Finance

From a recent Wall Street Journal article, Supermines add to Supply Glut of Metals [subscription required]:

Those giant mines are now giving the industry an extra-bad hangover during the bust. The big mines cost so much to build and extract minerals so efficiently that mothballing them is unthinkable—running them generates cash to pay down debts, and huge mines are expensive to simply maintain while idle. But as a result, their scale means they are helping miners dig themselves even deeper into the price trough by adding to a glut.

How long will it take the mining industry to work through this period of oversupply? Only time will tell.

The post China Sneezed and the Mining Industry Caught Pneumonia appeared first on the Emerson Automation Experts blog.

China Sneezed and the Mining Industry Caught Pneumonia

Jim Cahill — Tue, 19 Jan 2016 19:45:00 GMT

Author: Alan Novak

A few charts of the underlying commodities and related company stocks show just how bad it has been.

Global copper price:

Source: InfoMine – 5 Year Copper Prices and Price Charts

Freeport McMoRan stock:

Source: Google Finance

Iron Ore Price:

Source: InfoMine – 5 Year Iron Ore Fines Prices and Price Charts

BHP Billiton stock:

Source: Google Finance

From a recent Wall Street Journal article, Supermines add to Supply Glut of Metals [subscription required]:

Those giant mines are now giving the industry an extra-bad hangover during the bust. The big mines cost so much to build and extract minerals so efficiently that mothballing them is unthinkable—running them generates cash to pay down debts, and huge mines are expensive to simply maintain while idle. But as a result, their scale means they are helping miners dig themselves even deeper into the price trough by adding to a glut.

How long will it take the mining industry to work through this period of oversupply? Only time will tell.

The post China Sneezed and the Mining Industry Caught Pneumonia appeared first on the Emerson Process Experts blog.

Improved Mining Safety and Operational Performance through Solids Level Measurement

Jim Cahill — Fri, 15 Jan 2016 16:26:10 GMT

Some industries, such as the mining industry, face the challenge of having to measure the level of solids. Unlike liquids, they must content with the peaks and valleys depending on the consistency of the solids being measured.

Emerson’s Asael Sharabi shared a story with me about a Canadian copper miner. In their mining process, they crush five different types of ore. The raw ore is passed through a crusher and the crushed ore is stored in the ore pass/underground silo.

The trouble was that they were experiencing excessive maintenance costs and availability issues caused by the daily wear and tear on the crusher, specifically to the ore pass. The damage to the ore pass is caused by the ore falling directly onto the trap door at the bottom of the pass, known as a press frame. This press frame is coated with a rubber liner to reduce the force of impact from the falling rocks. In their mining operations, these were wearing away the liner very quickly and damaging the press frame.

The falling rock could also escape the ore pass and damage nearby lighting, posing a risk to worker safety.

Rosemount 5708 3D Solids Scanner

Not only was the repair cost greater than $100,000, the associated downtime could be several days. The mining operations staff needed to source a level measurement that would measure down to the bottom of the ore pass that is 225 feet deep. Various level measurement technologies were tried with hopes of producing a buffer of stationary rock to act as a cushion. These instruments were not able to measure the level due to dust and the area dimensions.

Also, the buffer of rock meant there was too much ore in the pass and different grades of ore would be unintentionally mixed causing inefficiencies during processing.

After these attempts, the miner installed a Rosemount 5708 3D Solids Scanner on the top of the 225-ft ore pass. The transmitter was able to penetrate the dust and the sensor was able to measure right down to the bottom of the ore pass, avoiding the trap running empty and meeting the accuracy requirements. This ability to measure the lowest point helped to make sure that neither the line nor the press frame was exposed to the falling rocks.

This solution not only helped to improve worker safety and to avoid repair costs and associated downtime; it also helped to avoid the operational performance issues caused by the mixing of ores.

You can connect and interact with other level measurement and mining experts in the Level and Metals and Mining groups in the Emerson Exchange 365 community.

The post Improved Mining Safety and Operational Performance through Solids Level Measurement appeared first on the Emerson Automation Experts blog.

Improved Mining Safety and Operational Performance through Solids Level Measurement

Jim Cahill — Fri, 15 Jan 2016 16:26:10 GMT

The falling rock could also escape the ore pass and damage nearby lighting, posing a risk to worker safety.

Rosemount 5708 3D Solids Scanner

Also, the buffer of rock meant there was too much ore in the pass and different grades of ore would be unintentionally mixed causing inefficiencies during processing.

This solution not only helped to improve worker safety and to avoid repair costs and associated downtime; it also helped to avoid the operational performance issues caused by the mixing of ores.

You can connect and interact with other level measurement and mining experts in the Level and Metals and Mining groups in the Emerson Exchange 365 community.

The post Improved Mining Safety and Operational Performance through Solids Level Measurement appeared first on the Emerson Automation Experts blog.

Improved Mining Safety and Operational Performance through Solids Level Measurement

Jim Cahill — Fri, 15 Jan 2016 15:26:00 GMT

The falling rock could also escape the ore pass and damage nearby lighting, posing a risk to worker safety.

Also, the buffer of rock meant there was too much ore in the pass and different grades of ore would be unintentionally mixed causing inefficiencies during processing.

This solution not only helped to improve worker safety and to avoid repair costs and associated downtime; it also helped to avoid the operational performance issues caused by the mixing of ores.

You can connect and interact with other level measurement and mining experts in the Level and Metals and Mining groups in the Emerson Exchange 365 community.

The post Improved Mining Safety and Operational Performance through Solids Level Measurement appeared first on the Emerson Process Experts blog.

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