ABSTRACT
During the design phase of any mining operation, it is very important to ensure ore production with specific quality characteristics, which are mainly established by the standards of each consumer. While high and medium frequency quality variations of the ore, can usually be compensated using homogenization and/or mixing techniques, and appropriate short-term production planning, low frequency variations can be reduced by appropriate mine planning and design to ensure constant production quality throughout the whole operation, which may last a few decades. In this study, the influence of two strategic development options (scenarios) on the long-term quality variation of lignite extracted from the South Field mine at the Ptolemais-Amydeon basin, are examined. In both scenarios the continuous mining method is applied. In the first scenario, the field is divided in 10 sectors and pivot operations are applied for 2 sectors and parallel operations for the remaining 8 sectors. In the second scenario the field is divided in 11 sectors and pivot operations are applied on all sectors. Simulation results showed that the second scenario is better for reducing the long-term variability of lignite quality.
