Worldwide consumption of steel, aluminum, and electronics has significantly increased the mining demand for precious metals, base metals, and mineral commodities.
With increased demand comes the need for reliable material handling in the Mining and Minerals industries. Whether it is stockpiles, dump hoppers, ore-passes, surge bins or belt-to-belt transfer chutes, proven, practical solutions are available to improve handling of ores and concentrates.
Common Mining & Minerals Industry Challenges
At the mine site, the run-of-mine (ROM) ore, as well as crushed ore, needs to be stored, reclaimed, and conveyed reliably, whereas at the processing plant, the concentrate needs to be fed reliably to furnaces, calciners, roasters, or smelters. Moisture content, time of storage, particle size distribution, and impurities (such as clay) can drastically alter the reliability of material flow through a handling system. Poor flow will interrupt process uniformity and increase the costs for the mining operation. Particle size segregation in stockpiles and bins can cause problems particularly when handling erratic concentration of fines. Segregation can lead to problems in uniform feeding to pyro-processing or hydrometallurgical operations. Many ores and mineral oxides attack hoppers and transfer chutes causing rapid abrasive wear. Fine concentrates and powders can be prone to flooding (flushing), creating poor process control. Gravity reclaim stockpiles often experience ratholing, resulting in severely restricted “live” capacity.
Common Materials Handled
Below, please find a shortened list of the bulk materials we have successfully handled in the Mining & Minerals industry to date. Please note the below list is just a small sampling of the materials we've handled for clients in the Mining & Minerals industry.
- Iron ore, iron ore concentrate, DRI
- Bauxite, refined alumina
- Limestone, lime
- Copper ore, copper concentrate
- Trona ore, soda ash
- Potash (K2O)
- Precious metals (gold, platinum, silver)
- Base metals (nickel, lead, zinc)
- Coal and coke
- Alumina
Amorphous Silica
Asbestos (rock, fiber)
Bauxite
Borax (anhydrous)
Clay (kaolin, talc)
Coal (bituminous, anthracite, etc.)
Cobalt
Copper (ore, concentrate)
Diatomaceous earth
Dolomite (burnt)
Feldspar
Flint
Flourite
Foundry sand
Gold
Granite
Gravel
Gypsum
Iron ore fines
Iron ore rock
Iron ore briquettes
Hydrated lime
Lead
Lithium
Lime (burnt, pebble, caustic)
Limestone
Magnatite
Magnesite
Manganese
Melamine
Mica
Molybdenum
Nickel (ore, concentrate)
Perlite
Phosphate (rock, fines, ore)
Platinum
Potash salt
Pyrite
Quartz sand
Quartzite
Quicklime
Refractory ore
Rock salt (halite)
Sand
Silver
Shale
Sumas
Silica gel
Silica sand
Silicon crystals
Silicon dioxide
Soapstone
Soda ash
Stone dust
Tantalum
Titanium
Trona (soda ash)
Tungsten oxide/carbon mix
Uranium (ore, concentrate)
Vanadium
Volcanic ash
Wollastonite
Zeolite
ZInc
Zircon
Mining & Minerals Industry Clients
Below, please find a sampling of clients who we have successfully provided bulk material engineering services for in the Mining and Minerals industries.
- BHP
- Rio Tinto
- CVRD (Vale)
- Potash Corp.
- Anglo American
- US Gypsum
- Atlantic Copper
- Engelhard
- Kennecott Copper
- AECOM
- Agnico Eagle
- Agrium
- AMEC
- Anatolia Minerals
- Anglo
- Arava Mines
- Ausenco
- Barretts Minerals
- Barrick Goldstrike Mines
- BlackRock Metals
- BHP Biliton
- BHP Copper
- Boke Trading
- Boyne Smelters Ltd.
- Carbones del Cerrejon
- Xstrata
- Cliffs Natural Resources
- Cortez
- Falconbridge Ltd.
- FMC Corp.
- Freeport-McMoRan Copper and Gold
- Glamis Gold
- Gold Fields La Cima SA
- Rio Tinto
- Hatch Ltd.
- IMC Kalium
- Inmet Mining
- Iron Ore Company of Canada
- Jacobs Engineering
- Newmont Mining
- Kinross Gold
- Mineracao Taboca SA
- Moa Nickel SA
- Molcorp Minerals LLC
- The Mosaic Company
- New Gold Inc.
- PT Freeport
- Penoles
- Searles Valley Minerals
- SNC Lavalin
- Solvay Minerals
- Stillwater Mining
- Teck Cominco
- Thyssen Krupp
- Vulcan Minerals
- Yamana Gold
- American Olean
- Armstrong World Industries
- Cabot
- Camargo Correa Industrial, Brazil
- CertainTeed
- Degussa, Germany
- Elk Roofing
- Engelhard
- FMC
- Fuller Company
- Great Lakes Carbon
- Harbison Walker
- Lafarge
- Lafarge Canada
- Lockheed
- Minproc Technologies
- Negev Phosphates, Israel
- Norwegian Talc, Norway
- Potash Corp. of Saskatchewan, Canada
- Rotem Fertilizer, Israel
- Solvay Minerals
- Tamko
- Tenneco Minerals
- U.S. Borax & Chemical
- U.S. Gypsum
- Vulcan Materials
- Westvaco
Mining & Minerals Industry Services
We offer a wide array of services for the Mining & Minerals industries:
- Plant visit to audit process or problems
- ROM, ore, concentrate, flow and TML testing
- Silo, bin, hopper, or feeder design
- Stockpile design (gravity-reclaim)
- Transfer chute design using proven DEM analysis
- Ore pass flow troubleshooting and design
- Silo structural engineering
- Abrasive wear testing to assess liners
Whether you are mining iron ore, bauxite, copper or gold ore, Jenike & Johanson helps facilities worldwide keep materials flowing reliably (mass flow), providing higher throughputs and increased profits.
Explore our solutions, review case studies, or contact us so we can help you to solve or prevent costly material flow problems experienced in the Mining & Minerals industry.