Global Road Technology (GRT) has served a globally renowned mining and resource organisation which owns a large scale, long-life open-cut mine in Central Queensland. To properly transport this coal reserves, this mining operation has included over 70km of haul road, with an average width of 20m.
This coal mine has one of the largest coal reserves in the world, amounting to almost one billion tonnes of coking coal. Moreover, the current annual production capacity is more than nine million tonnes of coal and predicted to rise significantly in the next ten years.
The issues
- The reduction in visibility on haul roads caused by vehicle generated dust, preventing clear communication between drivers and increased risk of collision.
- The respiratory and environmental impact uncontrolled dust.
- The current cost of running water trucks and the potential need to purchase additional trucks to keep dust under control with water alone.
- The availability of water to manage coal dust, and pressure to not consume natural resources also in demand from local communities and farming.
- Regulatory compliance.
The Solution
GRT’s client was pressured by the local government to reduce the amount of water used in this particular mining operation. With these pressures in mind, the miner ultimately decided to transition towards a more sustainable, environmental, and economical solution for managing and suppressing dust, especially on the mining operation’s haul roads.
Furthermore, with the total amount of water resource previously available to the mine reducing at a significant pace due to warmer and dryer temperature, untreated water was sourced from other locations at additional costs.
To learn more about the results of this project, click here