News in Brief 05_2016

The North Rhine-Westphalian State Environment Minister, Johannes Remmel, summarised the results of a feasibility study for an underground pumped-storage power station at the Prosper-Haniel mine near the city of Bottrop in a few words: “Prosper-Haniel could be transformed from a mine into a power station and then into a battery”. He presented the first part of the study alongside Chairman ...

“Anyone who isn’t inspired by tradition cannot shape the future.” That is the quote with which Association Chairman Kurt Wardenga welcomed around 80 guests to the 50th anniversary of the Bund Deutscher Bergmanns-, Hütten- und Knappenvereine e. V. (Association of German Mining and Smelting Communities) on 18th June 2016 in the German Mining Museum in Bochum (Figure 1, 2). Guest ...

In August 2016, the German Coal Importer Association (VDKi), Hamburg, presented its annual report which, among other things, addressed the development of global coal markets (Figure 1). According to the report, coal mining fell worldwide by almost 3 % to 7.0 bn t in 2015. At 10 %, the drop in coking coal was significantly sharper than the 1.6 % drop in steam ...

Crude oil, natural gas, coal and metals – raw materials giant Russia extracts millions of tons of its mineral resources every year and continues to work hard to develop new resources. To do so, it relies increasingly on efficiency, sustainability and reliable production processes – all of which are aspects that are also important to the Georg Agricola Technical University ...

Without them, a great deal of our essential modern technology would be inconceivable: Rare earth metals – known as “rare earths” for short – are used in wind turbines, LEDs, high-performance batteries and MRI scanners, to name a few. Unlike the name suggests, these metals are not actually rare, but their deposits are distributed unevenly around the globe. Today, over ...

Peru is one of the richest countries in South America in term of raw materials: It has the world’s largest known copper resources and is one of the largest producers of gold and silver. However, the mining boom does have its drawbacks: Use of obsolete technologies and lacking environmental standards result in immense water consumption and extensive chemical pollution of ...

The 1st International Conference “Mining in Europe” took place in Aachen in May 2016. Prof. Bernd Lottermoser as conference chair took the opportunity to focus within the renowned Aachen International Mining Symposia (AIMS conference series) on the new key issue “Mining in Europe”. Having attracted more than 300 participants from 28 countries, the two-day conference was an extraordinary success. The ...

From 6th to 10th June 2016, a German delegation visited the town of Lubumbashi in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Fifteen companies from the mining supply sector took part in this market reconnaissance trip. They were accompanied by representatives from the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWi), the Verband Deutscher Maschinen- und Anlagenbau (VDMA – German ...

A German delegation visit, organised by the Centre of Excellence for Mining and Raw Materials at the Chamber of Industry and Commerce (AHK) in South Africa and their new office in Zambia, travelled to the town of Solwezi in June 2016. The group, composed of German suppliers in the mining industry, made contact with potential business partners. Solwezi lies in ...

In recent years, an ongoing drought has caused a severe power crisis in Zambia. The new analysis “Power crisis and consequences for solar energy in the Zambian mining sector” from the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH, Eschborn/Germany, in its role as facilitator of the Project Development Programme (PDP) and the consulting company THEnergy, Munich/Germany, shows that the framework ...