Dust Control – Soil Stabilization – Erosion Control

Archive for the ‘haul road’ Category

Sydney based road tanker manufacturer and rental business, Water Trucks Direct, have made a decision to standardise on Aussie Quik Prime pumps from Australian Pump Industries ’ product range. The company, operating from a facility at McGraths Hill in Sydney make a complete range of water tankers equipped for both dust suppression and water transport.

“We chose the Aussie pumps high pressure pumps because of their big flow, high pressure performance and overall reliability” said Water Trucks Direct Managing Director, Brenden Bastian. “The 5 year warranty offered by Australian Pump is a tremendous bonus” he said.

Water Trucks use both high volume transfer pumps for fast filling in 3”, 4” and 5” sizes. The big volume pumps are either PTO or hydraulic drive with diesel options being available. Smaller tankers in the 10,000 litre range use Aussie 3” self priming gushers that produce flows of up to 1,500 litres per minute. Genuine Japanese Honda petrol engines, one of the major features offered by Australian Pump and Yanmar diesel drives are both used depending on the application and customer’s requirements.

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The dust from a mine is significantly different from the dust you find in your home. Dust in your home primarily consists of dead skin while mine dust is almost exclusively a mineral in a fine powder form.

Most written definitions of mine dust include the following: dust from drilling, blasting, smashing or handling of rock. The majority of the dust created by one of these activities are too large to stay in the air for an extended period of time and account for about 40 percent of all dust created at a mine site. The remainder is less than 10 micrometers in size. The majority of these particles is less than 2.5 micrometers and come from the exhaust of equipment used on the mining site.

The smallest size particle is what is most hazardous to the population’s health. The larger dust particles are an eye sore and are cost a lot to clean up, but are less hazardous to one’s health.

The smaller particles do make certain health hazards that include respiratory problems due to the fact that they are in the air that is breathed in to the lungs. This can be minimized if mining personnel were to wear masks designed to filter out the dust.

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Alberta’s oilsands are pumping the equivalent of a major oil spill into the Athabasca watershed every year, says an independent report.

The research study, published yesterday in the U.S. journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, suggests toxic emissions from the oilsands are nearly five times as high and cover twice as much area than reported by Suncor and Syncrude.

Dr. David Schindler, one of the report’s authors, said the results show that better monitoring is needed and more remedial measures need to be taken to ensure the health of those living along the Athabasca River and its tributaries.

"I think the human threat is already there," he said yesterday.

"We’re hoping when the government sees this, they’ll make efforts to upgrade their monitoring programs and we’re hoping to develop a model that the government will pick up and execute."

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RAIPUR: India’s largest private sector steel maker, Tata Steel, will invest Rs.2,000 crore on environment conservation at its Rs.19,500-crore plant coming up in Chhattisgarh’s militancy-hit Bastar district.

"Tata Steel officials made a presentation at a public hearing on Monday for environmental clearance and committed to invest Rs.2,000 crore on environment conservation," Bastar district collector M.S. Paraste, who presided over the meeting, told IANS.

Describing the hearing as "quite successful", Paraste said 2,044 hectares of land would be handed over to Tata Steel, probably by December.

District authorities have so far acquired about 80 percent of land across 10 villages in Lohandiguda block, some 340 km south of state capital Raipur, for the integrated plant that will produce 5.5 million tonnes of steel annually.

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Haul Road Dust Control  is a fundamental element to the efficient venture of a mining company. Not only with regards to security but as well to the employees wellbeing.  Surface mining operations use huge off-road haul trucks extensively to move material at mining properties. Historical research, using the United States Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) emissions factors for unpaved haul roads, has revealed that haul trucks produce the bulk of dust emissions from surface mining sites, accounting for approximately 78%-97% of total dust emissions. This is even greater with a low value haul road dust control  program.

Observations of dust emissions from haul trucks prove that if the dust emissions are unrestrained, they can be a safety danger by means of impairing the operator’s visibility. This increases the likelihood for haul truck accidents. Yet, the greatest long-term health risk of dust generated from hauling operations is due to breathing of the respirable dust [median diameter <4 micrometers (μm)] and thoracic dust, which is equivalent to the EPA’s definition of PM10 [particulate matter with a median diameter <10 μm]. Exposure to respirable dust has always been considered a health hazard on surface mining operations, particularly if silica dust is there.

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The design of the latest Cat mining trucks exceeds its predecessors and offers the ultimate in productivity, durability and low cost of operation even in the most challenging mining operations.

97F Cat® Mining Truck
The 797F, with 4,000-horsepower (2983 kW) and rated payload capacities to 363 tonnes, combines the strengths of its predecessors with a new engine, redesigned operator station and custom body systems to deliver even lower costs per tonne – with less environmental impact.

The 797F also offers easier maintenance and enhanced safety provisions. Ground level service points ease access, and 1,000-hour hydraulic filter service intervals reduce required maintenance. Safety enhancements include wider walkways, a rear access ladder and a bumper-mounted, three-way, lock-out tag-out box.

The 20-cylinder, 4,000-gross-horsepower Cat C175-20 ACERT engine has a single engine block and is the heart of the new truck. The engine has accumulated more than a quarter-million hours of field testing in mining trucks and power-generating systems. The C175 displaces 5.3 litres (323 in³) per cylinder – for a total displacement of 106 litres (6,458 in³). The 797F develops 450 horsepower more than its predecessor, the 797B, which used a 24-cylinder Cat 3524B engine displacing 117 litres (7,143 in³).

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A month ago, U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords told a Green Valley newspaper that she’s not “anti-mining.” Late last week, she proved it. At a three-hour tour of Freeport McMoran’s Sierrita complex north of Green Valley, at a site where copper has been mined for a century, Giffords was as effusively friendly as she has been critical of the proposed Rosemont Mine in the Santa Rita Mountains across the valley.

She had many reasons, but they boiled down to differences between living with an existing mine in a long-compromised area and bringing a new one into a more pristine site — and to differences in trust between neighbors of Freeport and of Rosemont.

Freeport’s mine — where mining has occurred for a century — employs 1,000 people and sprawls 1.5 by 2 miles in its open pit. A peek inside the 1,500 foot deep pit shows about 25 mine benches, each about 50 feet tall, heading toward the bottom. To the pit’s west lies the rocky Sierrita Mountains.

The mine processes 160,000 to 170,000 tons of ore daily, down in this recessionary area from 220,000 a year ago. Rock is blasted five days a week, three to five times daily. Electric shovels cost $25 million and stand 64 feet high. Each of 18 haul trucks can carry 162 tons for crushing. A mill building stands five stories tall.

Finally, the company’s 3,500 acre tailings impoundment stands as a testimony to past dust complaints from residents but also offers promise for future groundwater cleanups and newer dust control equipment, since the company is proposing to do a massive, very expensive cleanup of tainted groundwater lying underneath and spreading from the tailings.

At one point, Giffords marveled to company officials: “You’ve got quite a piece of land. How did it get like this?”

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Stark County Commission members’ Tuesday vote gives GTL Energy USA Ltd. the go ahead to operate a coal beneficiation plant near South Heart during their Tuesday meeting.

The commissioners decided during their meeting to change the land from agricultural to industrial.

Mary Hodell, who spoke on behalf of Neighbors United at the meeting, is against the zoning change.

“Why does it have to be right in the middle of agricultural land?” Hodell asked.

Chairman Duane “Bucky” Wolf said accessibility to the railroad and Interstate 94 makes it a good place.

Hodell also wants the commission to set strict rules for the trucks going to and from the plant, saying she’s already seen trucks breaking from suggested routes.

“If you’ve got road agreements, what’s the consequence when they don’t follow this? And they haven’t been,” Hodell said.

Commissioner Russ Hoff said the road agreement between GTL and Stark County covers “anywhere from dust control to different roads that they’re taking, signage on roads, weight permits — it pretty much covers it all.”

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After seeing the haul road for himself, an inspector for Pima County Flood Control confirms what community activists and county supervisors have been saying.

Activists brought photos to the county board alleging Portland Cement has begun building a haul road before a federal permit has been issued and in a different location than its site plan indicates.

The investigator, pointing to blue flags along an existing road in the area, says new haul road ground has been bladed, closer to the Davidson Canyon Wash than the site plan indicates.

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A DUMP truck driver found his workmate crushed to death in a horrific mining haul road accident.

Tam Frame was the first man on the scene after dad-of-two Jim Griffin was crushed between two 35 tonne haul road trucks at Pennyvenie open cast mine.

He relived his experience at a fatal accident inquiry into Jim’s death this week.

The 40-year-old Drongan man suffered massive chest and internal injuries in January last year.

At Ayr Sheriff Court, Mr Frame said he arrived at the scene after another colleague, Jim Harvey, gave Jim a jump start.

Mr Frame, 66, also of Drongan, said: “Jim Harvey was sitting in his truck at that time and I stopped the haul road truck.

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