Fachartikel 2019

In view of increasing import dependencies and decreasing ore grades in conventional mining, societies with large resource needs such as those of the EU are looking for new potential sources of mineral supplies. Seabed areas in international waters host considerable amounts of mineral resources that contain various elements, among them metals such as cobalt, copper, nickel and manganese that are ...

Any attempt to look ahead at the likely economic developments in 2019 must necessarily take into account a number of significant political events, some with potentially disruptive consequences. The first of these would be the trade disputes arising between the USA and other countries, most notably China, the hope being that these matters will soon be resolved. Another no less ...

The recommendations contained in the so called “Coal Commission” roadmap for phasing out coal-based electricity production will oblige the German energy industry and regional economies to embark on an adventure that is the result of climate-policy ambitions that no other sector has yet been asked to engage in. The Duden German language dictionary defines the word „adventure“ as an unusual ...

Condition monitoring and analysis of mining equipment requires more than suitable and reliable sensor technology, but also a holistic approach that makes use of interdisciplinary capabilities and intelligent software applications. Today, modern sensors consist of hardware and software components and ensure that machine data can be recorded and transmitted at any time. The Internet of Things (IoT) uses innovative software ...

A decrease in output, caused by iron-clay or rather siderite, has been detected on the fifth and sixth floor of the opencast mine Hambach of RWE Power AG, Essen/Germany, since 2005. The material is known as hard to extract, so several special types of buckets were developed and used on the bucket wheel excavator 293. In this summarized diploma thesis ...

Mineral processing plants are complex systems. Their products need to meet certain ridged criteria be it for use as a construction material or for further processing as an ore concentrate. The properties of a material entering the plant however may vary considerably. This is due to the location in the deposit it originates from as well as climate conditions. So ...

Mine closure is a topic that is being discussed frequently as illustrated by the closure ceremonies of the last two German deep coal mines in December 2018. Besides the commemoration of the miners, the main question is what is to be done with the underground infrastructure of the abandoned mines? The closure of a mine can be cost-intensive; backfilling of ...

It’s a pleasure for me to welcome all of you to the 9th regional conference of the Society of Mining Professors (SOMP) at the TH Georg Agricola University in Bochum. As Chair of the University board, I would like to thank you all for coming to this prestigious institution to share your valuable knowledge and experience (Figure 1). Over the ...

The new series of publications under the generic title “Documentation of technical developments at RAG” aims to preserve the know-how that the German coal industry has built up over the last 50 years, to provide a knowledge platform for specialists in this area and to disseminate this information to an international audience. This initiative may well also inspire engineers to ...

This article aims to lay out the basis of and steps toward the variety of technical developments leading to the current state of technology. It starts with a quantitative overview of the past 50 years of research at RAG Aktiengesellschaft, Essen/Germany, followed by some aspects of the research content, the financing and organisation. This contribution can be seen as a ...