COMMINUTION AND CRUSHING
Looking for obvious parallels between the two sectors , Douglas pointed out the potential inclusion of the OK™ Mill in the mineral process flowsheet . This mill , a vertical roller mill solution for grinding raw material , cement and slag , carries out grinding with 5-10 % less power consumption than other vertical roller mills with the lowest maintenance costs of similar machines in its class , according to FLSmidth .
It also offers a potential dry comminution route through integrated air sweeping off to the screening section of the plant .
“ With the OK Mill the question is : how wet can the feed material be for it to work as optimally as it should ?” Douglas said .
While those in the MTCR try to figure that out , Douglas says there is potential for the machine being trialled in a precious or battery mineral flowsheet .
“ While the OK Mill technology is not likely to be applied in a 100,000 t / y-plus copper concentrator , it could find a home in a smaller gold plant or a lithium operation ,” he said , adding that the pebble crushing circuit is a potential location for it .
Dziedzina says the company is talking to gold mining companies about such a plant configuration , explaining this could provide exactly the sort of demonstration the mining sector requires to factor it into more mineral processing discussions .
FLSmidth estimates that the inclusion of the OK Mill in a low impact , MissionZero grinding flowsheet could reduce grinding energy per kWh / t by 35 % over conventional technologies – providing the sort of ‘ carrot ’ the sector may require to test it out .
The company ’ s integrated process thinking starts at the very start of the flowsheet with crushing , according to Bill Malone , Global Product Line Director for Primary Crushing in Mining .
“ Every project is unique , but nine times out of 10 , material goes through a primary gyratory and into an intermediate stockpile ,” he told IM . “ Then it is drawn off a stockpile at a steady rate to hit the secondary stations to potentially produce a feed for a high pressure grinding roll ( HPGR ).
“ We try to stabilise what is going into that intermediate stockpile as quickly as possible as that trickles down the flowsheet .”
The company is aided in this goal with its TSUV Mark 5 Top Service Gyratory Crusher , which FLSmidth bills as the world ’ s most opex- and capex-efficient gyratory crusher .
The top-service design prioritises safety , maintenance and efficient crushing performance , FLSmidth says . Unlike other gyratory crushers that require workers to get underneath the crusher to perform high-risk maintenance , the TS range allows service and maintenance to be carried out from above , increasing speed , safety and simplicity . Additionally , the 100-plus tonne , fully-dressed main shaft no longer needs to be guided into the eccentric assembly by hand , with an automated process that dramatically reduces risk .
Boasting power handling capabilities of up to 1,500 kW and an 1,800 mm feed opening and mantle , the TSUV offers increased flexibility and throughput to provide as ‘ standardised ’ a feed to the secondary stations as possible , according to Malone .
“ Having the power and the capacity to not compromise means we can run the machine at the proper rate to get as near as constant drop off onto that stockpile as we can get ,” he said . “ The more we can standardise and homogenise at the start , the better it is for follow-on processes .”
Being at the front of the flowsheet , uptime and efficiency are key metrics for these crushers , and this is where a control system that , in its most advanced form , provides vibration , shock and oil condition monitoring , helps .
An ability to plug in the characteristics of the incoming feed can allow the crusher to automatically fine tune its operation , too .
Malone explained : “ If you are putting in fine material , you don ’ t want it to be too fine , which means you can open the machine up a bit to get the correct size . If you are putting in coarse material , meanwhile , you want to try and nip it a bit more to ensure everything in that intermediate stockpile can get as close to the standard size as possible .”
By inputting such properties ahead of time into the machine ’ s control system , the TSUV can automatically adjust to the chosen feed and optimally crush material . This is a particularly useful feature for large mine sites where operators may be mining several pits at the same time .
While the first greenfield installation for the TSUV will be at the Rio Tinto-owned Gudai-Darri iron ore mine in the Pilbara of Western Australia – which Malone expects to start full commissioning later this year – FLSmidth also has high hopes for many brownfield operators lining the new crushers up for replacement of legacy technology .
Taking the next steps in efficiency
For Pekka Vauramo , CEO of Metso Outotec , the development and rollout of more Planet Positive mineral processing solutions could coincide with its customers ’ ability to obtain higher margins for their own products .
Boasting power handling capabilities of up to 1,500 kW and a 1,800 mm feed opening and mantle , FLSmidth ’ s TSUV Mark 5 Top Service Gyratory Crusher offers increased flexibility and throughput
“ There are opportunities at both ends of the scale ,” he told IM . “ One is to find technologies we can build and demonstrate that are more energy efficient and cost effective , and , second , help our customers develop higher-margin opportunities for our customers .”
The introduction of ‘ green steel ’ products is one obvious example Vauramo pointed out , but there are other miners already leveraging their environmental credentials to set their products apart from the rest of the market .
Boliden , for instance , became the first company in the world to offer two separate copper products produced with a drastically lower carbon footprint than the global average ( less than 1.5 kg of CO 2 per kg of metal ) last year . Its Low-Carbon Copper is produced from concentrate from its own copper mines using clean energy , with the company expecting the reduced carbon footprint benefits to eventually translate to a market premium over ‘ standard ’ products .
Products deemed ‘ Planet Positive ’, which is Metso Outotec ’ s all-encompassing approach to sustainability , will help such industry pioneers .
Planet Positive covers the environmental , social and financial aspects of sustainability , focusing on the positive impact on the environment and people through further growing its sustainable offering with products that are demonstrably more energy or water efficient than the market standard , or help customers achieve other priorities such as circularity and safety , as well as services that help customers improve their productivity , Metso Outotec says .
An offering that already includes some 100 products – and contributed sales of € 592 million ($ 646 million ) in 2021 – the Planet Positive portfolio will exhibit a growth rate that is at least twice that of Metso Outotec ’ s bottom line growth , according to Vauramo .
For this year , the addition of the company ’ s service offering into Planet Positive territory is one of the big hurdles , but it is one Vauramo is confident Metso Outotec can overcome .
26 International Mining | APRIL 2022