SME announces the 2019-2020: Henry Krumb Lecture Series

Abstract

SME helps bring outstanding speakers to the Local Sections through the Henry Krumb Lecture Series. The program is offered to SME sections to enhance their appreciation and understanding of important new methods and technologies. Lecturers are selected from the professionals who present technical papers at the SME Annual Conference & Expo. The Henry Krumb Lecture Series, established in 1966, is administered by SME and partially funded by a grant from the Seeley W. Mudd Memorial Fund. The 2019-2020 Henry Krumb lecturers are profiled below. To request a lecturer to speak at one of your local section meetings, visit the SME website at www.smenet.org/membership/groups/henry-krumblecture-series.

SME helps bring outstanding speakers to the Local Sections through the Henry Krumb Lecture Series. The program is offered to SME sections to enhance their appreciation and understanding of important new methods and technologies. Lecturers are selected from the professionals who present technical papers at the SME Annual Conference & Expo.

The Henry Krumb Lecture Series, established in 1966, is administered by SME and partially funded by a grant from the Seeley W. Mudd Memorial Fund. The 2019-2020 Henry Krumb lecturers are profiled below. To request a lecturer to speak at one of your local section meetings, visit the SME website at www.smenet.org/membership/groups/henry-krumb-lecture-series.

ADELE L. ABRAMS

Legal and ethical considerations for mine safety professionals

Environmental, health and safety professionals (EHS) have responsibility for many activities, including management of regulatory and proactive programs, performing audits, and training employees and contractors. These activities also carry significant personal and corporate legal liability exposure, from the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) and in tort actions arising from negligent training, inspections and supervision. In addition, unethical activities or allegations can cost EHS professionals their hard-earned certifications. This presentation will address the legal and ethical considerations for EHS professionals, strategies for effective management of liability exposures and proactive solutions. Among other things, it presents detailed instructions on legal privilege issues, preparation of accident reports, management of inspections, OSHA/MSHA conferences and more.

Adele L. Abrams is president in the Law Office of Adele L. Abrams PC. She is a certified mine safety professional and an attorney representing employers in OSHA and MSHA litigation nationwide, and she provides safety law consultation, safety audits and training services. She is on the adjunct faculty of the University of Colorado-Boulder and the Catholic University of America, where she instructs on employment and labor law. Abrams practices in multiple federal courts and is a graduate of the George Washington University's National Law Center. She earned her B.S. from the University of Maryland. She is active in SME's Health & Safety Division and in its Industrial Minerals & Aggregates Division. She is a professional member of the National Safety Council, where she received the Distinguished Service to Safety Award.

CORBY ANDERSON

Star Regulus and the Triumphal Chariot of Antimony

Antimony is a silvery white, brittle, crystalline solid classified as a metalloid that exhibits poor conductivity of electricity and heat. Alchemists were fascinated by a property of antimony to form a crystalline star (i.e. the Star Regulus) under certain conditions. For alchemists, of course, that symbolized the quintessence of matter. In the Western world, it was first isolated by Vannoccio Biringuccio, and he first described this in 1540. In 1604, Basilius Valentinus (15651624) wrote a monograph on antimony entitled Triumph-Wagen des Antimonij (Triumphal Chariot of Antimony). This is regarded as the first monograph devoted to the chemistry of a single metal. Currently, the primary production of antimony is isolated to a few countries and continues to be dominated by China. As such, antimony is currently deemed a critical and strategic material for modern society. This presentation will outline the occurrence, production and critical aspects of this fascinating element.

Corby Anderson is the Harrison Western Professor at the Colorado School of Mines (CSM). He is a registered engineer with 40 years of global experience in industrial operations, corporate level management, engineering, design, consulting, teaching, research and professional service. He holds a B.S. in chemical engineering from Montana State University, an M.S. from Montana Tech in Metallurgical Engineering, and a Ph.D. from the University of Idaho in mining engineering-metallurgy. He is a Fellow of the Institution of Chemical Engineers and of the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining. He shares 12 international patents and six new patent applications covering several innovative technologies, two of which were successfully reduced to industrial practice. He has received SME's Wadsworth Award for his contributions in hydrometallurgical research and the SME Distinguished Member Award. He has also received the International Precious Metals Institute's Tanaka Distinguished Achievement Awar^ (Continued on page 65) the Outstanding Faculty Award from the George S. Anseli Department of Metallurgical and Materials Engineering at CSM and became a Distinguished Member of the University of Idaho Academy of Engineering. In 2017, he received the EPD Distinguished Lecturer Award from The Minerals, Metals and Materials Society.

KWAME AWUAH-OFFEI

New SEC rules for disclosure of exploration results, mineral resources and mineral reserves: What you need to know

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has adopted new rules on how mining firms registered in U.S. markets are to disclose exploration results, mineral resources and mineral reserves. These rules (found in Regulation S-K Section 1300) are intended to better align U.S. rules with the Committee for Mineral Reserves International Reporting Standards (CRIRSCO) guidelines that are in force globally. This talk discusses the major changes introduced by the new rules and their impact on how mining professionals and firms estimate and disclose exploration results, resources and reserves. The talk also reviews the major differences between S-K 1300 and the SEC's Industry Guide 7, as well as differences between S-K 1300 and other CRIRSCO-based rules. The talk highlights the role of qualified persons under the S-K 1300 rules.

Kwame Awuah-Offei is an associate professor at the Missouri University of Science & Technology and the interim director of its mining engineering program. He served as a mining engineering academic fellow at the Securities and Exchange Commission for 18 months, starting early 2015, and as an expert consultant to the commission for another two years. He holds a Ph.D. in mining engineering from the Missouri University of Science & Technology. His research interests include modeling, simulation and optimization for sustainable mining. He has industry experience in surface gold mining and aggregate mining. He is a licensed professional engineer.

MIKE BOTZ

Production modeling for heap leach operations

A variety of modeling techniques can be utilized to forecast metal production at heap leaching operations. These approaches reflect a range of complexity, flexibility, time to implement, cost and accuracy. For many operators, a spreadsheet-based modeling technique is attractive, since the calculations are directly accessible, models can often be developed by site staff and the results are generally easy to extract and interpret. Mike Botz and John Marsden have developed a spreadsheet-based modeling technique that provides a high degree of flexibility, while still considering detailed operating information for ore properties, leach kinetics, scale-up factors, lift height and in-heap metal invent oríes. The technique involves establishing kinetic leach curves for each ore type to characterize metal extractions, followed by application of separate metal-recovery curves to define the rate at which leached metals exit the heap in pregnant solution, taking into account delays due to the in-heap solution inventory. At any point, the difference between total metal extracted and total metal recovered is equal to the in-heap inventory of the leached metal. This modeling technique is particularly useful for larger multi-lift heaps where delays in metal recovery are appreciable due to in-heap solution holdup. The technique is also applicable to sites with multiple heaps, leach cycles and/or metal recovery plants (e.g., carbon columns for gold or solvent extraction for copper). A description of the modeling technique is presented, along with a short discussion of two other commonly used modeling approaches.

Mike Botz is a consulting process engineer at Elbow Creek Engineering Inc. in Billings, MT. He has worked in the mining, petrochemical and specialty chemical industries. He holds a B.S. degree in chemical engineering from Montana State University and an M.S. degree in chemical engineering from Purdue University. With more than 25 years of experience, Botz has completed more than 200 projects worldwide ranging in scope from upfront feasibility studies through plant design and commissioning. He has co-authored two books and has published more than 35 technical papers. He is a licensed professional engineer.

MATTHEW DEUTSCH

Openpit mine optimization with operational constraints

Modern openpit mine planning and optimization has made great strides in tackling complex challenges such as block based scheduling, blending, stockpiling, and uncertainty. However, a disproportionately small amount of time has been spent on making sure that the resulting schedules are actually achievable. Many of these highly sophisticated techniques do not, in general, translate into practical, operational mine designs that can be used. Ultimate pits still violate minimum mining width constraints, schedules still require taking small parcels of material from disparate areas of the pit in a single period, and grade control polygons are still ragged, narrow, and not minable with realistic equipment. Engineers are required to manually modify their optimized mine plans and may inadvertently destroy substantial value.

This lecture will explore several different techniques for managing operational constraints in openpit mine optimization. From tried and tested to new and unproven, there are many techniques that can be brought to bear on these prob- lems and can give mining engineers valuable insight and help ensure that they make safe, economically responsible and operational mine plans.

Matthew Deutsch is a mining engineer at Maptek North America in Highlands Ranch, CO and is also a Ph.D. student at the Colorado School of Mines. He received his B.S. in mining engineering from the University of Alberta. His work and research focuses on helping mining engineers and geologists make better decisions. He primarily works on problems in openpit optimization, openpit design, geostatistics and grade control.

TIMOTHY M. DITTRICH

Concentrating rare-earth elements from coal fly ash leachates using ligand-associated organosilica media

Rare-earth elements (REEs) have many critical uses in advanced technology and the lack of a reliable domestie supply has been identified by the U.S. Department of Energy as a vulnerability to U.S. economic security. This research focuses on developing an economical process for extracting REEs from coal fly ash by coupling a hydrothermal extraction process with the engineering of a ligand-associated media for concentrating REEs from the extraction liquid. Ash samples from coal-fired power plants near Detroit, MI are subjected to hydrothermal conditions from 100-350 °C for 1-24 hours and leachate concentrations are measured by inductively coupled plasma-mass spectroscopy and compared to hydrofluoric acid digestion results. The ligand-associated organosilica media begins with the selection and loading of ligands such as DIPEX and modified DTPA to a commercially available swellable, organically modified silica media to sorb/concentrate the REEs dissolved in the leachate after the hydrothermal extraction process. Results show the potential for bulk extraction and also sequential extraction due to ligand selectivity for heavy REEs.

Timothy Dittrich is an assistant professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Wayne State University. He received his B.S. degree in biological systems engineering from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, an M.S. in biological and environmental engineering from Cornell University and a Ph.D. in civil and environmental engineering from the University of Colorado-Boulder. He was a postdoctoral scholar at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in Los Alamos, NM for three years and a staff scientist for two years. His research interests are in the areas of contaminant geochemistry (including radioactive contaminants), treatment of contaminated water and soil using natural systems, sustainable urban development, development of hazardous waste treatment strategies and resource recovery from waste products.

MARCOS GOYCOOLEA

Lane's Algorithm revisited: A new look at Lane's cutoff grade optimization algorithm

In 1964, Kenneth Lane proposed an algorithm to optimize the production schedule of a single-metal, single-processor openpit mine. For this, he proposed a policy based on varying, over time, the so-called cutoff grade, or grade threshold, used to determine if extracted material should be considered ore or waste. Lane's algorithm had a profound impact on the mining industry. Not only did it change the way ore is defined, it inspired multiple commercial software systems and has been taught to almost every aspiring mining engineer. This talk will show that Lane's problem can actually be formulated as a quadratic integer programming problem and solved with modern commercial optimizers. Using such an optimizer, the authors put Lane's algorithm to the test and found that on a data set comprised of six large, real mines, Lane's algorithm computed the optimal solution in every single one of them, in less than a thousandth of the time taken by the optimizer. Though it was shown that Lane's algorithm is not always guaranteed to provide an optimal solution, the authors explain this practical performance by showing that the critical cutoff grades used in Lane's algorithm are actually the optimality conditions of a time-continuous variant of Lane's problem. The lecture also highlights some other features of his algorithm and discusses the implications today of Lane's amazing contribution.

Marcos Goycoolea is a professor in the Business School of Adolfo Ibáñez University, in Santiago, Chile. His research specializes in optimization theory and the design of optimization-based decision-support systems for natural resource management, with an emphasis in strategic mine planning. He has focused on developing project management methodologies applicable to openpit and underground planning, porting the latest techniques from large-scale and stochastic optimization. This has resulted in a number of new methodological developments, as well as the professional mine planning optimizer Alicanto Scheduler used by Barrick, Newmont Goldcorp, Codelco and other major mining companies to schedule unusual and complex openpit and underground operations. Goycoolea holds a degree in mathematical engineering from the Universidad de Chile, and a Ph.D. in industrial and systems engineering from Georgia Tech. He regularly teaches optimization and operations management courses.

SCOTT KLIMA

Reducing shuttle car operator dust exposure by improving continuous miner blowing face ventilation parameters

Researchers at the U.S. National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) performed laboratory testing to examine and improve airborne dust capture and methane removal performance of flooded-bed scrubbers on continuous mining machines using a blowing face ventilation configuration to reduce respirable dust exposure to shuttle car operators. Several testing conditions were examined to minimize shuttle car operator dust exposure without adversely affecting continuous miner performance and production. Curtainto-face setback distance, face ventilation airflow and the use of side-body-mounted blocking sprays (on versus off) were the three primary parameters compared. Scrubber airflow was set and maintained at 198.2 m3/min (7,000 cfm) throughout testing. An examination of slab cuts versus box cuts and the location of the shuttle car (present behind the continuous miner versus not present in the entry) was also performed to demonstrate the effects of these constantly changing scenarios on scrubber performance. Results show that the best blowing face ventilation setup for minimizing shuttle car operator dust exposure for the tested parameters uses a 15.2-m (50-ft) curtain-to-face setback with 339.8 m3/min (12,000 cfm) face ventilation while operating the side-body-mounted blocking sprays.

Scott Klima is a mining engineer with NIOSH's Pittsburgh Mining Research Division in the Dust, Ventilation and Toxic Substances Branch. He graduated with a B.S. in mining engineering from The Pennsylvania State University and has been with NIOSH for more than five years. His research focuses on reducing respirable dust exposure of mine workers in underground coal mines. This includes developing methods to improve operating parameters and controls of continuous miner and longwall sections to reduce these exposures.

STACY KRAMER

Creating a safety culture that leads to zero fatalities

While health and safety is often measured by incident rates and reactionary measures, at the end of the day safety is about people. It's about creating relationships and building trust among the workforce. Front-line supervisors and health and safety professionals are the core of safe production and have the best opportunity to influence those doing the work. Developing front-line supervisors and H&S professionals and arming them with the tools to work with the employees in the field creates a culture of trust, respect and collaboration. In this session, we will review an approach to elevate the role of the frontline supervisor and H&S professionals, develop tools to keep them in the field and focused on the critical work to drive positive culture change.

Stacy Kramer is vice president of Corporate Safety & Occupational Health at Freeport-McMoRan in Phoenix, AZ. She began her career with Phelps Dodge in 1996 where she worked in various positions with increasing levels of responsibility in health and safety. In 2006, she became the health and safety manager for the Safford, AZ mine during its design, construction, commissioning and eventual operation. In 2008, she became manager of the Hydrometallurgical Division in Safford and, in 2013, she became the director of risk management at the corporate office, responsible for global fatality prevention and FMA health and safety. Kramer has a B.S. in occupational safety and health from the Montana School of Mineral Science and Technology and a Masters of Public Health in health and safety management from the Tulane University, School of Public Health. She has been a certified safety professional since 2000 and has a Six Sigma Blackbelt from Motorola University.

ASHISH RANJAN KUMAR

Dust control examination using computational fluid dynamics modeling and laboratory testing of Vortecone and impingement screen filters

Wire-mesh type fibrous screens in the flooded-bed dust scrubbers used on continuous miners are prone to clogging due to the accumulation of dust particles. This clogging resuits in a reduced capture efficiency and a higher exposure to personnel. This research establishes the Vortecone, an inertial wet-scrubber system, as a suitable alternative to existing filters. The Vortecone accelerates fluids into a vortex chamber which preferentially moves the heavier particles toward the surface to be trapped by the circulating water film. Computational fluid dynamics models indicate excellent cleaning efficacies, especially of larger particles. Laboratory experiments in a reduced scale model of the Vortecone validate the computer models and show capture of 90 percent of particles exceeding about 5.20 pm and 3.20 pm at air flows of 0.283 m3/s (600 cfm) and 0.378 m3/s (800 cfm), respectively. An impactor-type, self-cleaning, nonclogging impingement screen system was designed as a substitute for conventional screens used in continuous miners. The parameter, filter performance factor is proposed to compare the performance of the three systems (Vortecone, fibrous screen and impingement screen) under similar flows. The Vortecone was found to be the most efficient dust-cleansing system and also the most power-intensive filter. The impingement screen shows a similar cleaning efficiency and a much higher availability compared to the conventional fibrous screen.

Ashish Ranjan Kumar is a post-doctoral scholar in the Department of Mining Engineering, University of Kentucky. He holds an undergraduate degree from the Indian School of Mines, an M.S. and a Ph.D. from the University of Kentucky, all in mining engineering. He uses computational fluid dynamics and scale modeling techniques for research on ventilation and dust filtration systems. He serves as the Coal and Energy division's representative on SME's Young Leaders' Committee. He is a licensed professional engineer in the State of Kentucky.

MIGUEL REYES

NIOSH research toward the implementation of refuge alternatives in underground coal mines

The U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration mandates the installation of refuge alternatives (RAs) to enhance protection for mineworkers unable to escape after a mine disaster. The NIOSEİ Mining Program took up efforts to characterize the industry, in terms of the number and types of RAs used, to develop program initiatives and promote the safe use of RAs. NIOSH is actively conducting research to advance the knowledge and technologies available for use in the implementation of RAs through laboratory and field investigations. This talk provides an overview of the industry profile and presents some of the impacts that have been achieved.

Miguel Reyes is currently the electrical and mechanical machine safety systems team leader for the Electrical Team at NIOSH's Pittsburgh Mining Research Division. He earned a B.S. degree in electrical engineering from the University of Texas-El Paso in 2006 and joined NIOSH in 2007. Since then, he has been engaged in research improving the health and safety of U.S. mine workers. He has led various research efforts focused on mine illumination, emergency communication and tracking, battery safety, proximity detection/collision avoidance and refuge alternatives for underground coal mining. He has also led numerous technical collaborations on research projects with universities, mining companies, international partners, mining equipment manufacturers and other government agencies.

YORK SMITH

Lithium: Resources, recovery and recycling

Lithium has become a critical material for renewable energy, energy storage systems, and glass and ceramics. Due to rapidly increasing demands for lithium and global reserves that are not well characterized, the future resource availability for lithium remains undefined. In this talk, geological availability of lithium resources and production processes of lithium from primary sources (minerals, brine and sea water) and secondary sources (industrial wastes) will be discussed from technical and environmental perspectives. The experimental results of laboratory-scale recovery processes which were innovated in our research group to recover lithium from low-grade primary resources (the Great Salt Lake) and secondary resources (end-of-life lithium-ion batteries) will also be discussed.

York Smith is an assistant professor in the Materials Science and Engineering Department at the University of Utah. His love for snow-covered peaks and open spaces led him to the University of Nevada, Reno where he obtained his B.S. and M.S. degrees in chemical engineering. Given his only criterion of decent skiing, he then moved to the University of Utah where he obtained his Ph.D. in metallurgical engineering. After a postdoctoral research appointment from the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Smith joined the faculty at the University of Utah. His general research interests include chemical metallurgy, interfacial phenomena and electrochemistry. His present research projects include lithium resources and extraction, and nonferrous metal recycling.

PATRICK ZHANG

Characterization study of an abundant secondary resource for yttrium and heavy rare earths

The Critical Materials Institute (CMI), an energy innovation hub funded by the U.S. Department of Energy and the Florida Industrial and Phosphate Research Institute (FIPR), in collaboration with the Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the Colorado School of Mines, is conducting research to recover rare earths, phosphorus, magnesium and uranium from phosphate clay. Phosphate mining in Florida generates more than 1 t (1.1 st) of phosphate clay, or slime, per ton of phosphate rock produced. Since the start of large-scale washing and desliming for phosphate beneficiation, more than 2 Gt (2.2 billion st) of slime have accumulated. In addition, REEs in Florida phosphate clay contain a higher proportion of yttrium and heavy rare earths than many of the primary rare earths minerals in the world. This paper presents the most comprehensive chemical, physical and mineralogical characterization of phosphate clay. The information generated from this study is vital for formulating mineral separation schemes to concentrate REE- and P-containing materials for downstream extraction of these critical elements.

Patrick Zhang is research director at FIPR in Bartow, FL. He obtained his Ph.D. from University of Nevada, Reno,an M.S. from the Chinese Academy of Sciences and a B.S. from Northeastern University, China, all in metallurgical engineering. He has 25 years of experience in phosphate research and six years of research background in gold extraction and cyanide waste treatment. Since 1993, he has served as a research director with FIPR at Florida Polytechnic University. In this post, he led the institute's beneficiation program to global prominence by conducting nearly 30 in-house projects, managing more than 100 research contracts, chairing eight international conferences, editing seven books on phosphate processing, and authoring numerous technical papers and book chapters.

YI DAVID) ZHENG

Eva uation of roof bolter canopy air curtain effects on airf ow and dust dispersion in an entry using blowing curtain ventilation

Roof bolter operators may be exposed to high respirable dust concentrations on continuous miner sections with blowing face ventilation when bolting is performed downwind of the continuous miner. One solution to reduce the high respirable dust concentrations is to use a canopy air curtain (CAC) to deliver clean air from a filtered blower fan directly to the bolter operators under the canopies. The influence of a CAC installation in the airflow and dust dispersion around the location of the roof bolter operator can be evaluated by using computational fluid dynamics. This study, performed by NIOSH, considers two scenarios: a roof bolting machine in the center of the entry for installation of the fifth row of bolts from the face and a roof bolting machine positioned close to the face for the installation of the last row of bolts. In both scenarios, the bolting machine is placed in an environment that contains 6.0 mg/m3 of respirable dust and is ventilated by a blowing curtain with 1.42 m3/s (3,000 cfm) of air. This environment is used to simulate the roof bolter machine operating downstream of a continuous mining machine. Two operational positions are simulated at the same bolting location - dual drill heads in the inward position for two inside bolts and dual drill heads in the outward position for two outside bolts. The influence of the CAC on airflows and dust dispersion is evaluated with the CAC operating at 0.12 m3/s (250 cfm). This study clearly revealed the importance of a breathing zone underneath the CAC for roof bolter operators to improve their working practice.

Yi (David) Zheng currently is a mining engineer working for the dust control team at NIOSH in Pittsburgh, PA. He received his Ph.D. degree in mining engineering and his master's and bachelor's degrees in mechanical engineering. His research areas include mine safety, health and hazards engineering; mine ventilation; mine diesel particulate matter, methane and industrial respirable dust simulation and control; computational fluid dynamics flow study; and experimental design and data analysis. ?