:: Research Group to Enhance Mining’s ‘Green’ Credentials with Roller Machines

A Brisbane-based minerals industry research group dedicated to enhancing energy efficiency in the mining industry has been awarded an AUD$150,000 research grant by Queensland Environment Minister, John Mickel. The University of Queensland’s Julius Kruttschnitt Mineral Research Centre (JKMRC) was one of eight groups who received funding from round six of the Environmental Protection Agency’s Queensland Sustainable Energy Innovation Fund.

The High Pressure Grinding Rolls or HPGRs as they are known are already used in cement manufacture and the diamond extraction industry. The broader scale use of HPGRs for metalliferous minerals has only recently been considered, with preliminary research in this area being conducted by JKMRC PhD researcher Mike Daniel

The JKMRC was one of eight research groups to recently share in excess of AUD $1million funding from the Queensland Government’s Sustainable Energy Innovation Fund. From left are PhD researcher Mike Daniel, AMIRA International Business Manager David Stribley, Queensland Environment Minister John Mickel and JKMRC P9 research leader Emmy Manlapig.

HPGRs have a number of potential benefits, both economic and environmental, including:

• Substantial reductions in water requirements for processing minerals the HPGR is a dry processing device.
• Substantial reductions in process energy requirements the HPGR is more energy efficient than conventional mills in some applications.
• Substantial waste reduction in mining through a process of ‘enhanced liberation’ obtained with the HPGR which targets and extracts minerals in an ore body more efficiently.

The HPGR has yet to be proven in production as an appropriate alternative for large base and precious metal mining operations in Queensland and elsewhere around Australia. One challenge is to see how useful the HPGR will be when called upon to treat harder ore with lower grade from new ore bodies.

The JKMRC team aim to demonstrate the benefits of the HPGRs by acquiring with EPA funding a pilot scale version of the device and running trials at various mine sites around Queensland. The EPA grant will help the JKMRC carry out this work as part of the world’s longest running minerals processing project Project P9 which is coordinated by the JKMRC and AMIRA International.