Thesis (M.S.)--West Virginia University, 2005 / Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains viii, 138 p. : ill. (some col.), col. map. Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (p. 81-85).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Wyoming, 2008. / Title from PDF title page (viewed on August 7, 2009). Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (MSc)--University of Stellenbosch, 2006. / Bibliography. Also available via the Internet.

M.Sc.

M.Phil. / In an ever - increasing competitive business world it is essential to optimise the replacement of expensive mining equipment. The decisions regarding the replacement of assets used in a coal mine are usually based on life cycle costing models. Financial methods such as Net Present Value, Internal Rate of Return or Payback are applied to determine the feasibility of replacement of the asset. Whereas these methods and other models such as life cycle costing, challenger / defender and the Non-Homogeneous Poisson Process models can be applied in most cases, it is deemed to be insufficient as the sole decision making tool for the replacement of mining equipment. The development of another tool to assist in the decision making process is required for specific use by the engineer to be used in conjunction with the traditional financial models. Key performance indicators are used extensively in the mining industry to manage the performance of equipment and are deemed to be essential components in achieving the organisation's objectives. There are certain limitations when using only the traditional financial life cycle costing methods when viewed from the engineer's perspective, since they do not directly incorporate the level of the maintenance function and the performance effectiveness of the asset. The engineer usually requires more insight into the performance of the asset to assess the feasibility of replacement, hence the need for an additional tool that incorporates these key performance indicators. In most cases there are relationships between the various key performance indicators themselves as well as between them and the operating and maintenance cost of the asset. The key performance indicators used are availability, reliability (mean time to failure), maintainability (mean time to repair) and the operability (tons per direct operating hour). There are certain factors that may lead to the excessive operating and maintenance cost of an asset, especially if there is no investigation into the reasons for the excessive cost. Examples are sub-standard maintenance practices and an insufficient level of service from suppliers. Both are issues that can be resolved with a consequent decrease in the cost of ownership of the asset. Cost as the only indicator of the feasibility of replacement may therefore not be a true reflection of the real status of the performance of the asset. Weighting factors are used to allocate values to the key performance indicators in terms of their contribution towards achieving the organisational objectives. The equipment effectiveness is derived from these values to give an indication of how well the equipment is performing against predetermined benchmarks. This dissertation attempts tb find a solution to the problem through the use of the key performance indicators in addition to the existing models that focus on the financial aspect in order to provide a more accurate assessment of the replacement requirement of an asset in an opencast coal mine.

M.Phil. / In the modern world maintenance organisations are exposed to rapid changes in equipment complexity and the maintenance thereof. Maintenance people have to adopt completely new ways of thinking and managing. If organisations and their management do not adapt to these changes and challenges they are destined to oblivion. Moubray (1991:1) states that: "Managers everywhere are looking for a new approach in maintenance. They want to avoid the false starts and dead ends which always accompany major upheavals. Instead they seek a strategic framework which synthesizes the new developments into a coherent pattern, so that they can evaluate them sensibly and apply those likely to be of most value to them and their companies" One of the viable alternative business strategies and maintenance approaches in dealing with equipment complexity and hence the management thereof, is by means of maintenance outsourcing and contract setting. If done correctly it reduces the risk of organisations and increases flexibility. During outsourcing initiatives organisations will look for benefits such as improvement of its profit margins by means of inventory reductions, improved reliability, maintenance efficiency and expert skills maintaining their assets. Coetzee (1997:24) explain that the task of the maintenance function is "to support the production process with adequate levels of availability, reliability and operability at an acceptable cost". The same principles apply in adherence to the maintenance contracts where the Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) or contractor also needs to support the customer with the adequate levels of availability, reliability and operability at defined costs. This can only be achieved by quality maintenance; "the right level of maintenance performed at the right time to the right equipment by workmen able and willing to deliver quality workmanship and using correct task specifications" (Coetzee, 2000a). The method used in maintenance outsourcing negotiation and binding agreements between the organisation and the contractor is a Repair and Olivier-2008 Department of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering - UJ Maintenance Contract; commonly known as R+M or MARC contracts. Essentially a Repair and Maintenance contract is the outsourcing of a long term Service Level Agreement (SLA) or maintenance project, normally to the OEM, or its authorised service organisation. "A maintenance and repair contract is a contractual agreement between the OEM (original equipment manufacturer), or contractor, and the equipment owner or user, where the OEM or contractor carries out all maintenance and repair activities at a guaranteed rate per hour" (Lugtigheid, et al. 2007). When organisations adapt outsourcing as a business strategy, it creates a framework of uncertainty and risk to Original Equipment Manufactures and/or maintenance contractors who has to perform the maintenance services. The focus of manufacturing and selling is thus disrupted by the challenge of the unknown playgrounds of competitiveness

The concept of this thesis was developed during the author's two years of work with the British Columbia Ministry of Mines and Petroleum Resources as a Reclamation Inspector. During that period (1973-75) one of the author's major duties was to review reclamation plans prepared by mining companies, pursuant to Section 8 of the Coal Mines Regulation Act3 as applications for either surface mining permits or permit extensions. The quality of these reports varied greatly, with few being really comprehensive. No uniform standard of reclamation report was achieved by industry or, perhaps even more important, demanded by the Ministry. Reclamation programmes on many mining operations were suffering from an obvious lack of management planning. Work was being undertaken without clear objectives, and no apparent attempt was being made to develop an ongoing planning process. The author contends that the following characteristics are implicit in the term "management planning": 1. A stated management period; 2. An initial collection of facts and a description of the area to be managed; 3. An analysis of the facts and an assessment of management options; 4. The designation of management objectives; 5. The design of a programme to accomplish the objectives; and 6. A record of results and a collection of further information by inventory and research to be used in formulating the plan for the next management period. He further explains that, by intent, Section 8 of the Coal Mine's Regulation Act would appear at present to require most of these elements of a management process in the preparation of a reclamation report. The object of this thesis is to develop and illustrate a management plan format that reflects the continuous planning process outlined above. As a basis for the plan the experience and information gained by the author at Kaiser Resources Ltd.'s mining operation in Sparwood during the period 1971-1973 are summarized and interpreted, and management prescriptions formed from that synthesis. The thesis is written as though it were a management plan prepared in early 19 75 for the management period 1975- 1978. In summary, the format of the plan is essentially as follows: 1. An initial collection of facts and description of the area to be managed. This portion of the plan consists of two chapters; a description of the biophysical characteristics of the mining area, and a description of the mining environment to be reclaimed. The biophysical description includes topography, drainage, bedrock and surficial geology, soils, climate, vegetation and fauna. The description of the mining environment deals with the history of coal mining in the East Kootenay, the tenure of the mining area, and the location, extent and nature of mining, milling and exploration operations. 2. An assessment of Management Options. Two items are considered to be important in assessing reclamation management options; the environmental impact of the mining operation, and the legal responsibilities of the mining company for reclamation. Basically, reclamation is undertaken in order to mitigate some of the adverse effects of mining on the natural environment. For this reason, a discussion of the major impacts of mining, concentrating on those that can be mitigated by reclamation, is a prerequisite to the formulation of management objectives. This chapter of the plan contains a description of land capability for forestry, agriculture, wildlife and recreation, and a discussion of the impact of mining on land capability, water quality and the fishery resource. The second chapter of this portion of the plan deals with the legislative and administrative framework for reclamation in British Columbia. The Coal Mines Regulation Act currently states that reclamation must be carried out to a level satisfactory to the Minister, without defining what that level is. This chapter discusses present interpretations of the Act, the administrative procedures for reclamation enforcement, and speculates on the form that eventual reclamation standards might take. 3. The designation of management objectives. Management objectives are defined on the basis of the environmental impacts of the mining operation and on the legal requirements for reclamation. For the Kaiser Resources Ltd. operation the overall reclamation management objectives are defined as: i. To re-establish watershed values, by either mechanical means or the establishment of a self-sustaining vegetation cover, as soon as possible after the cessation of mining activities on any particular parcel of land. ii. To accomplish watershed rehabilitation in a manner that is compatible with the potential prime surface use of the land and consistent with post-mining site conditions. On the basis of the description of both the mining environment and land capability, two land use objectives are proposed: a. To provide food and, ultimately, cover for mule deer, Rocky Mountain elk and moose through the establishment of appropriate plant communities. b. To re-establish aesthetic values on all disturbed lands and, where possible, to - enhance opportunities for outdoor recreation. 4. The design of a programme to accomplish the objectives. This section of the plan consists of a discussion of the major constraints to successful reclamation and a description of the various components of the reclamation programme. The most significant constraints to reclamation on the Kaiser Resources Ltd. operation are considered to be, in decreasing order of importance: surface instability, soil temperature, soil compaction, soil chemistry, and increasing elevation. Seven components of the reclamation programme are described - species selection, seed collection, plant propagation, site preparation, seeding, planting, and tending. In each case, past experience, including cost information, is summarized, and major prescriptions proposed for the coming management period. 5. Assessment of Results. The assessment programme relates to the management objectives, and focuses primarily on watershed and wildlife habitat parameters. Parameters to be measured relate to water quality, protective cover, species composition, the degree of ungulate use, forage quantity and forage quality. The management plan thus prepared provides the framework for the two final steps in the management process for any particular management period; the subdivision of the area for management purposes, and the preparation of operational plans. The management area is divided, primarily for record keeping, into compartments, which are permanent unit's based on topography, access or mining operations, and sub-compartments, which are temporary subdivisions of compartments based on treatment. Each compartment should be subject to a specific land-use objective. Sub-compartments may be combined or further subdivided in the light of future operations. The last step in the process is the preparation of annual operational plans. These outline, for each year of the management period, the specific operations to be undertaken and the projected costs of each. Operational plans become the basis for the development of annual budgets. / Forestry, Faculty of / Unknown

Please read the abstract in the section 00front of this document / Dissertation (M Eng (Mining Engineering))--University of Pretoria, 2007. / Mining Engineering / MEng / unrestricted

A grid type portable rainfall simulator, developed at Virginia Tech from support by the Office of Surface Mining, Department of Interior under Grant NO. G5114009, was used to apply 2.3 inch per hour “storms” to three replicated plots to determine surface mine soil erodibility factors for two distinctly different soils in southern West Virginia. Other variables included in the study were detailed soil descriptions for each site, initial and final soil moistures, plot rainfall distributions and the particle size distributions of the eroded materials. The soil erodibility indexes for the silt silt-loam and sandy respectively. loam soils averaged 0.408 and 0.735. Erodibility indexes for the silt silt-loam decreased, while indexes for the sandy loam soil remained constant for repeated rainfall applications. Using statistical analysis, rainfall distributions were shown to be uniform across plots for most rainfall applications. From a particle size distribution analysis of the eroded soil material, the percentage of silt and clay decreased, while the percentage of sand increased at each site with repeated rainfall applications. A rock mulching effect was present at the end of each testing sequence. / Master of Science

A number of algorithms have been developed in order to determine the optimal final limits of an open pit mine. Due to the complex nature of this problem, however, very few of them can offer a reliable and complete answer. The case of an actual lignite deposit was used in this study, which enabled an investigation into the capabilities of one of the most established optimizers (Whittle Three-D™). A three-dimensional block model of the deposit was first developed, based on the available drillhole data, with the use of the Digital Underground™, an integrated geostatistical modeling package. The largest possible utilization of the original geologic information was intended, and the modeling results were correlated with existing reserves calculations and past geologic observations on quality characteristics. A flexible methodology was then followed to transform the geologic reserves block model into an economic one, where each block is assigned a net value. Two alternative objective criteria formulations where introduced to facilitate this scope. A series of parametric regular 3-D fixed economic block models were constructed by varying the block size and also some basic mining and economic parameters. A number of case studies were then conducted, to form an extended sensitivity analysis of the various parameters that affect the total value, tonnage, and waste volume of the final optimal pit. The conclusions drawn can develop useful guidelines for the decision making of the mine operator. The optimization also provides a detailed ultimate open pit layout, that can enable a comprehensive mine planning and design. / Master of Science