Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality

Transcription

1 DISCOVERY PRODUCTIVITY PROCESSING ENVIRONMENT COMMUNITY Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Laura Kuhar, Paul Breuer, Dave Robinson and Angus McFarlane 4 November 2015 MINERAL RESOURCES

2 Focus In Situ Recovery (ISR) for sub % level commodities such as: Copper Gold Uranium Nickel Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 2

3 Australian Opportunity 2013) Commodity Au Cu Ni U Australia subeconomic and inferred tonnes 4947 AUD$B (@$1700/oz) 237 Mtonnes 45.9 AUD$B (@$4.10/lb) 504 Mtonnes 23.8 AUD$B (@$20,000/t) 0.47 ktonnes 626 AUD$B (@$65/lb) 109 Quality of ore bodies Size, grade, mineralisation, gangue chemistry Depth Mining method/cost Location Remote, infrastructure, energy, water Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 3

4 We don t exactly tread lightly Bingham Canyon Mine Ridgeway Mine Sth Carolina: Block Cave Stadium which seats 9 million! Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 4

5 Can we extract the value and not leave the usual legacy? Uranium One s Christensen Ranch uranium ISR facility (Wyoming) Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 5

6 Technology is key Vertical wells required? Branched drilling Directional drilling Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 6

7 Technology is key Hydraulic fracturing fracfocus.org Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 7

8 Technology is key Hydraulic fracturing to create accessibility Proppants (sand) used to maintain pathway Enhance or bypass natural fractures Bulk flow paths or force solution pathway between fractures Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 8

9 Technology is key Access at the m to mm scale Thermal fracturing created by Difference in fluid and rock temperature Thermal gradient between two injection points / fractures Chemical reaction Microwaves, IR High voltage fracturing Electrokinetics (applied voltage/current) DOI: /54334 Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 9

10 CSIRO strategy Position In Situ Recovery (ISR) as a viable alternative to conventional mining of sub % level commodities Achieved by Collaboration with research and industry partners Topic specific research programs Industry engagement Test field site Case studies and field trials Reward ISR Conventional Risk Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 10

11 Review of global capabilities Information gathered on each capability Current state of the art in each particular area What is required to progress work in the area Basic description of the plan to fill knowledge and/or technology gaps Capabilities/collaborators Invited additional input where needed Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 11

12 Clustered R&D focus areas Environmental DECISION-MAKING Economics Social 3 Resource characterisation 2 PREPARATION Focus areas 6 Drilling, blasting, rock fracturing Monitoring and forecasting 8 7 Groundwater management and hydrogeology OPERATION Lixiviant management and reactive transport modelling Lixiviant system Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 12

13 Main challenge areas 1. ACCEPTANCE Environmental Economics Resource characterisation Social ACCESSIBILITY Focus areas Drilling, blasting, rock fracturing Monitoring and forecasting Groundwater management and hydrogeology 4. FLUID MOVEMENT Lixiviant management and reactive transport modelling Lixiviant system 3. LEACH CHEMISTRY Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 13

14 Major ISR adoption challenges Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 14

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16 Major ISR adoption challenges Limited ability to observe or measure factors influencing ISR performance Major issue in predicting recovery Difficult to diagnose poor performance Difficult to optimise or improve the process Limited availability and ability of ISR tools Perceived and actual Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 16

17 Resource characterisation Advanced characterisation tools relatively mature Advancements required in Data processing/analytics conversion of qualitative to quantitative data geostatistics Definition of ISR domains according to permeability, hardness, alteration, combination of these factors in conjunction with grade and extractability Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 17

18 Porosity, permeability & commodity access Limited capabilities Some experimental methods (usually laboratory-scale) exist Pumping tests conducted at field scale, but cannot obtain a deposit map of permeability and porosity from this information Methods need to be developed, improved or adapted to Quantify deposit porosity and permeability Monitor for changes that may occur during leaching Relationship to commodity access / recovery? Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 18

19 Drilling and permeability enhancement Drilling Require significant change in cost/speed (e.g. DET CRC) and directional control of drilling into, around and through hard rock targets Possibility of branching drill holes for deep deposits Permeability enhancement Create and maintain connected surface area ( porosity ) and permeability Methods include blasting, rock fracturing, electro-kinetics Tools needed to quantify / optimise access to the deposit Models need to be adapted, improved or developed Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 19

20 Lixiviant system selection Lixiviant systems and experimental techniques relatively well established for conventional leaching In situ conditions (temperature and pressure) could be favourable Need to establish Laboratory methodology and tools to determine leaching performance that simulates ISR conditions Solution instabilities, reagent consumption rates Upper limit of commodity recovery Lixiviant regeneration Application development at field-trial scale Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 20

21 Lixiviant management and reactive transport modelling Lixiviant control and management strategies proposed / available Barriers, sub-surface stirring, electro-kinetics Need to be further developed and proven Numerical reactive transport models have been applied to simple ISR problems (porous media and evenly distributed fractures) Need to be developed for discrete fractures and permeability Refined and tested on simple to complex ISR systems (ultimately field trials) Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 21

22 Social and environmental aspects Project integration of expertise in environmental risk assessment and social research Needed from the start of this project Social licence in design Identify concerns and limitations to ISR acceptability Research areas identified Establish a comprehensive and structured approach to understanding social dimensions Improve environmental assessment and monitoring for ISR Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 22

23 ISR R&D roadmap Capability development and tools Strategic research and technology development ISR test site (testing/development facility) Brownfield site Ability to access the ore and see the results ISR evaluation and field trials Greenfield sites Application of developed ISR capabilities and tools Collaboration partnership between researchers, technology providers, industry and other stakeholders Framework being developed Seeking expression of interest Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 23

24 Current ISR activities Grow the ISR community Interested parties added to our regular communication list Increase collaborative research activities Researcher workshops Modelling workshop in November Accessing the values symposium/workshop in December Industry meeting early next year to validate roadmap Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 24

25 Acknowledgements CSIRO ISR team leaders Dave Robinson Laura Kuhar Review contributors CSIRO Murdoch University Curtin University Others CSIRO Mineral Resources Making Hard Rock In Situ Recovery a Reality Paul Breuer Page 25

26 Thank you Paul Breuer Gold Processing Team Leader t e paul.breuer@csiro.au MINERAL RESOURCES