Final Report Sweden 2018
SME-TMS Study Trip Final Report
Preface
The board of the SME-TMS Student Chapter Delft has created this travel report for the Study Trip to Sweden. The participants (including ourselves) have written reports about company visits and all cultural activities. This made sure everyone was well prepared for the scheduled visits and activities. The sponsors and visited companies will receive this document and it is published on our website: http://sme-tms.tudelft.nl/.
We as a whole would like to thank all the sponsors that made this excursion possible in the first place! A special word of thanks to all the companies that invited us for a tour through their company, it is great to have these opportunities!
Roos Verwijs, Fabian Kamp, & Julia van Deventer Delft, July 2018
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Overall Schedule
Date Company Type of company Starting time Ending time visit
20-07-2018 - Traveling 18:30 00:30
21-07-2018 - Traveling 08:00 12:00
22-07-2018 Ice Hotel Cultural visit 09:00 16:00
23-07-2018 LKAB, Kiruna Presentation & 08:00 14:00 site visit
24-07-2018 New Boliden, Presentation & 08:00 14:00 Aitik Site visit
25-07-2018 New Boliden, Presentation & 09:00 17:00 Rönnskar Plant tour
26-07-2018 New Boliden, Wildlife center 12:00 20:00 Svansele
27-07-2018 Swerea, LKAB, Pilot blast 09:00 14:00 Mefos furnace visit
28-07-2018 Weekend Free Time Småskar
29-07-2018 Weekend Luleå Free Time
30-07-2018 New Boliden, Presentation & 09:00 14:00 Garpenberg underground visit
31-07-2018 Metso and Sala Company visit 09:00 18:00 Silver Mine
01-08-2018 SMA Minerals, Presentation & 9:00 13:00 Gåsgruvan site visit
02-08-2018 Epiroc Company visit 08:00 14:00
03-08-2018 Lundinmining, Presentation & 08:00 14:00 Zincgruvan site visit
04-08-2018 Weekend Free Time Stockholm
05-08-2018 Weekend Free Time until Stockholm 12:00
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Friday 20-07-2018 – Departure from Delft
Departure day! Today we are leaving for Schiphol Amsterdam to take the evening flight to Arlanda, Stockholm. This night we will sleep at the Arlanda Connect Hotel.
Program 18:30 Departure by train from Delft Station 21:20 Take off from Schiphol 23:20 Arrival in Arlanda, Stockholm
Saturday 21-07-2018 – From Stockholm to Luleå to Kiruna
We will wake up early in the morning to take the airplane to Luleå. Here we will pick up the bus and car and from there travel to Kiruna.
Program 09:30 Flight from Arlanda to Luleå 11:00 Pick up the rental cars 13:00 Arrival al Kiruna and check in at SpiS
Sunday 22-07-2018 – Exploring the area and visit to the Ice Hotel
On Sunday we will explore the area around Kiruna and visit the Ice Hotel.
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Monday 23-07-2018 – LKAB, Kiruna
To start off our study trip, we are visiting LKAB at Kiruna. We will first get a presentation about the company’s occupations and afterwards a visit to a site.
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A short introduction to LKAB ‘Our commitment extends far beyond the mines’ Quick Facts Ownership: LKAB Product: Iron Ore Location: Kiruna, Northern Sweden Current production rate: 15Mt/year (2006) Start of production: 1890 (open pit), 1960s (underground) Mining method: Automated sub-level Caving
Luossavaara-Kiirunavaara Aktiebolag (LKAB) is a Swedish mining company which mines iron ores at Kiruna and at Malmberget. Their production is sold throughout much of the world. LKAB has mines, processing plants and ore harbors. They produced 27.2 Mt of iron ore during 2017, how did they get there?
History If the legend is to be believed it all started with a squirrel hunt outside the village Masugnsbyn, near Junosuando in Torne Valley. A farmer found a peculiar black piece of stone and brought the stone to the merchants in Tornea and it was classified as iron ore. This discovery was in 1642 and started the mining and industry history in Malmfälten, which eventually lead to the mining company LKAB. The company was established in 1890 and has been an important cog in Sweden’s export industry and industrial development for more than a century. They have also been a reliable supplier and business partner to the European steel industry for the same length of time. (LKAB official website) A few highlights of LKAB: (LKAB official website)
1890 – establishment of LKAB with Carl Johan Ljunggren as first managing director. 1898 – The Swedish and Norwegian parliaments decide that the Ore Railway should be extended. Also, Kiruna is being developed by Hjalmar Lundbohm. 1907 – The Swedish State becomes a part-owner of LKAB and the trams begin to roll in Kiruna 1910 – The first processing plant is commissioned in Malmberget 1933 – After WW1 the ore production dropped to its lowest levels because of global economic recession. 1936 – After the recession the production rises to higher than before. 1955 – The first pelletising plant is inaugurated in Malmberget. 1965 – A new harbor in Lulea is inaugurated together with a new mine in Svappavaara and the first pelletising plant in Kiruna. 1969 – Miners’ strike begins, they strike for 57 days with a result in a switch to monthly salaries. 1974 – The record year for LKAB, in which 30 million tons of ore were produced. 1976 – LKAB becomes fully nationalized, with AB Statsföretag as the owner. 1981 – Olivine pellets become a great sales success. 1985 – Record profit of more than 1 billion SEK. 1997 – An experimental blast furnace for product development is built in Lulea.
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Kiruna The LKAB Kiruna operation is located in Kiruna in the north of Sweden (145 km north of the Arctic Circle). The city situated at an altitude of about 530m. The city of Kiruna/mine is connected to a railway system between Lulea and the ice-free harbor of Narvik (Norway). The Kirunavaara mine started production in the beginning of the 20th century. They started with open pit which was followed by underground mining. The Kiruna iron ore mine is famous for its high level of automation.
Geology LKAB’s exploration takes place both in association with existing mines and in new areas. The mining areas of LKAB are Kiruna, Marlmberget, Gruvberget, Leveäniemi and Mertainen. In this report Kiruna will be discussed as that is the site we will visit. The original reserve at Kiruna was some 1,800Mt. As of the end of 2008, LKAB estimated that the current proven reserve at the mine is 602Mt grading 48.5% iron. In this Kiruna mine site, the reserves and resources are as follows from table 1 nowadays.
KIRUNA QUANTITY MT PERCENT FE 2016 2015 2016 2015 KNOWN 2 12 41.4 48.3 INDICATED 159 217 45.4 45.8 INFERRED 37 83 40.3 44.2 Table 1, Kiruna mine quantity and percentage of Fe.
These ores are situated of the Fennoscandian shield and occur in a mid-Proterozoic continental setting. The formation is underlined by Archaen granitic gneiss and Lower Proterozoic greenstone basement. The host rocks consist of alkalic rhyolite, tachyte and tachyandesite ash flows and lava flows, shown in figure 1.
Figure 1, Geological map of the Kiruna district showing the setting of the iron ores. Kiruna (1), Luossavaara (2), Rektorn (3), Henry (4), Haukivaara (5), Nukutusvaara (6) and Tuollovaara (7). (Evans 2000)
The Kiruna orebody is 4000m long, 80-120m thick and reaches a depth of about 2000m. It was formed approximately 1.600Ma ago as a result of intense volcanic activity. Iron-rich solutions precipitated on to a syenite porphyry footwall. The ore layer was then covered by other volcanic deposits and sedimentary rocks. Later the whole orebody was tilted to its current dip of 5 -6 (Hitzman et al, 1992).
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Mining and Processing As already mentioned earlier the Kiruna iron ore mine started with open pit mining and after that they started sublevel caving, with sublevels spaced at 28.5m vertically. With a burden of 3.0-3.5m per ring, this yields around 8,500t for each blast. LKAB subsidiary Kimit AB supplies the explosives and prepares the holes for blasting. The main haulage level at Kiruna lies at a depth of 1,045m, with the mine’s ore-handling systems capable of handling 26Mt/y of run-of-mine rock. The transportation of the ore is done using the extensive railway system which brings the ore to the harbor. This is shipped to Europe and all around the world because of high quality.
Growth prospects Although the 1,045m haulage level was originally expected to serve the mine until at least 2015, higher production rates meant that a new level and shaft-hoisting system would be needed in future. LKAB studied the options for this, with a main haulage system to be located at a depth of 1,365m. The new main level will deepen the mine by 320m. A new haulage level will be constructed at 1,365m depth for shuttle-train traffic.
New mine locomotives and cars will be bought for a 1,435mm-wide track that will be wider than the previous mine levels. Ore will be transported via remote controlled shuttle trains to the crushing plant. The ore will then be skip-hoisted approximately 1.4km vertically in two stages to the processing plant. Mining will be carried out in ten production areas.
Each area will be equipped with an access road, ventilation and media systems, and multiple ore passes and rock chutes. Mining will be conducted in stages between the current 1,045m level and the new 1,365m level.
Health, Safety, & Environment Being one of the largest and most modern iron mines in the world LKAB Kiruna takes health, well- being and safety of their employees in high regard. Inside the mine, a big visitors centre is present. This centre enables both (new) employees and visitors of the Kiruna mine to get a good idea of what is going on in the mine. Inside the mine, several types of rock bolts are used for stability, which makes this mine less vulnerable for incidents regarding unstable roofs. There are also several other accident preventing measures, such as multiple fora where employees are given the space to highlight unsafe environments, clearly stated safety norms and a lot of safety trainings.
The Kiruna mine has a close relationship with its environment - without the mine, the Kiruna town wouldn't exist, which means the town has to make some sacrifices. In this case it is moving the whole town, which is situated on the hanging wall of the mine and therefore must be replaced in stages.
The new railroads which LKAB Kiruna had installed are electrical trains which are better for the environment. With these trains the products are transported to harbours. When the trains go downhill electricity will be generated, which is used to make the train ride in other parts of the track. In recent years the railway and roads of the Kiruna mine had been moved due to deformation of the subsoil at the old location. In this year the old city hall had been moved and it is expected that the whole city will be moved again around 2023.
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Sustainability & Efficiency LKAB’s Kiruna is a highly automated mine. From above ground several underground freight trains, loaders, and other heavy machinery are operated. This leads to the efficiency of the mine being pretty high. Because Kiruna’s ore reserves are so big, and new ore is discovered continuously, the town Kiruna has to be moved. Instead of relocating the complete city, LKAB has decided to only relocate the town's centre.
In this way the citizens will keep one town, instead of two that are slowly growing together again. the downside is, that since the ore reserves are so big, there is not really a reclamation plan yet, but, because the top of the old mine is so characteristic for the area, there is not necessarily reclamation needed above ground. During the summer, LKAB employs high school students to do summer work for the company, like mowing the lawn, or repainting the buildings. In this way they attract new employees and keep an open communication with the locals.
Marketing & Innovation The big advantage for LKAB Kiruna is that they are situated in Europe, which is attractive for customers from European countries. They are the biggest supplier in Europe, outside of Europe they are a tiny player in the world of steel. LKAB specifies in quality versus quantity, because the iron in the mine is of a high percentage (65%). Saudi Arabia for example is a big customer, since they do not have any smelters and therefore, they use the iron pellets of LKAB which can be directly used for steelmaking. LKAB is looking to expand their mine by creating a lower level. Since the ore is tilted, the town of Kiruna needs to be shifted for the expansion. LKAB makes effort to get everybody in the town on board with the plan by communicating with the people, creating jobs and they have a museum in the mine to create more understanding and support for their business. Next to that, they are constantly looking into better ways of optimizing their remotely operated mine, to make it even more modern than it already is today.
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Tuesday 24-07-2018 – Aitik, New Boliden
On Tuesday we are going to start off the day with a guided tour through Aitik. Aitik, just south of Gällivare in northern Sweden, is Sweden's largest open-pit coppermine. After the tour, we will eat lunch and then head of to the Boliden Hotel, where we will stay for the next 3 nights.
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New Boliden The company operates the oldest mining district, Garpenberg. The mining district has been in operation for around 800 years already, back in the days the district was mined for iron, but nowadays it also produces zinc, lead and silver.
Company history New Boliden is formed in 1931 form a merger of Västerbottens Gruvaktiebolag and Skellefteå Gruvaktiebolag, owners of several holdings in the Boliden area. Therefore, the name of the new company became Boliden. The 1930s, not widely regarded as the most prosperous decade of the past century, were regardless of global crisis a very prosperous decade for Boliden and its gold production.
During the following decades, Boliden and the surrounding community grew in the sparsely poplulated area of northern Sweden. Even an international discord (1940) was able to stop the growth of the company. From the 1940, the company developed a new permanent facility at Laisvall, due to the global shortage of lead. The lead mine of Boliden remained the largest lead quarry of Europe till 2001, with the closure of the mine.
The period of 1940 till 1970 can be marked a period of further development of Boliden in both the technological and mining business. The period between 1970 and 1980 is characterised as a period of a series of corporate takeovers. Within this period Boliden acquired new operations, not only within Sweden, but even in our own country, the Netherlands. Districts in Germany and Spain were acquired as well. The company was taken over themselves as well. In 1987 it was first taken over by Trelleborg, a Swedisch giant and in 1997 it was sold and changed their names into Boliden Limited. The reason of selling was a large corporate restructuring of Trelleborg. Boliden Limited had his headquarters in Toronto and traded it stocks on the Montreal and Toronto stock exchange. Cause of another reorganisation in 1999, it was listed on the Stockholm stock exchange and relocated in 2001 back to Sweden.
A new name, namely New Boliden, rose in 2003 after gaining assets in smelting and mining from Outokumpu, a Finnish company. Locations of these new assets were in Finland, Norway and Ireland. Most assets in North America from the old days have been sold and re-invested into assets in Europa in order to restructure.
Boliden – Open-pit Copper mine Aitik The Aitik mine gives access to Copper (70.861 tonnes), Silver (53.612 tonnes) and gold (1.765 kg) ores and is located in Gällivare, Sweden. After these numbers it is not surprisingly that the Aitik quarry, with a dimension of 3 km long, 1.1 km wide and 450-meter-deep, is the biggest copper quarry within Europe and even the most efficient in the world. They started the open pit mine production in 1968 with a total of almost 700 Employees. The giant deposit was discovered in the beginning of 1930’s but production was possible since the 1960’s due to new technologies and equipment.
Geology The deposit is characterised by volcanic rocks penetrated by different granitic intrusions, all within the supracrustal metamorphosed shear zone of Precambrian age. The target zone is Biotite schists within the volcanic sequence containing disseminated chalcopyrite mineralisation, with averaging Copper, Gold and Silver less than 0.40%. The Gold and Copper grades increases towards the northern
11 | P a g e part of the mine. The biotite schist has an approximately thickness of 150 meter and is strongly foliated and sheared in the north south direction (by the Alpine Orogeny). Pyrite and Chalcopyrite appears in equal volume through the ore deposit. These target zones are located within the hanging wall (thickness 250 meter) and the footwall (thickness up to 600 meter). The hanging wall is made out of one massive hornblende gneisses unit, banded with alternation light grey and olive-green layers. The footwall is made out of quartz monzodioritic by intrusive volcanic origin. Interesting is that the hanging wall, ore deposit and the footwall are intersected on different locations by pegmatite dykes but are mainly thin and up to a maximum of 40 meter in thickness. The orientation of the pegmatite dykes is roughly North-South with a 60-degree angle, they are mostly found within the hanging wall which means that not all dykes are intersection the different zones.
Operating Performance There is a four-year construction period, which Boliden normally achieved 33Mt annual capacity, ramped up to 36Mt between 2011 and 2014. The stockpile waste rock is selling as a commercial product for the construction of roads and aggregate ballast. The mining method used is a combination of drilling, blasting and haulage of the rock material by trucks. These stages are processed by a drill plan lay out. The rock is crushed after loading to pieces smaller than 40 centimetres.
Health, Safety, & Environment The New Boliden company is one of the most modern and well-organized companies of Sweden. Knowing this, it is no surprise that New Boliden, and also New Boliden Aitik, take safety and environment very seriously. Aitik New Boliden believes that it is their social responsibility to create a work environment which is safe for both workers and inhabitants of surrounding villages. This can be seen by, for instance, the schedule of the blasting done in the mine - on the hours where the villagers have the least problems with it.
When it comes to the environment, Aitik New Boliden have several solutions to decrease negative impact. One of the solutions is installing an electrical trolley which will bring the mined products to the refining area. Another good example is the regulation of the acidity in, for instance, the tailing ponds. Its area can be over 13 square kilometres. The tailing ponds and concentrators might have a slightly decreased pH level due to process water and other metals and to compensate for the acidity, lime is added.
During our visit it was the hottest time in Sweden ever since the 19th century, which meant that the tailing pond evaporated more rapidly than usual. This resulted in more dust blowing into the environment, but this was solved by spraying water around the pond to keep the surface nice and moist.
Sustainability & Efficiency Aitik is powered on hydraulic power from nearby lakes. The new pellet plant has been built on top of a hill. This way the whole process ‘flows’ downhill and less transport energy is needed during the grinding and flotation processes. Everywhere inside the factory water is seen flowing down due to the gentle slope of the building. This water is mostly overflown from the several processes. At the bottom of each building, the water is collected and then re-deployed in the process. This way fewer minerals are lost.
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Aitik is currently building a new trolley line for the bigger trucks in cooperation with Caterpillar. This will lead to a big fuel saving, since a part of the transport will now be electrical. It is not the first trolley way in the world, South-Africa already is testing with this new way of transport, and also not the first in Europe: in the seventy’s experiments were already been executed, but because of the lack of technological knowledge we have today, it was no very successful. But, since technology has made huge steps in the previous years, it will be a very good experiment for Europe, that can be used for many more mines. Marketing & Innovation The Aitik mine employees around 700 people, most of them locals. This makes them the biggest private employer in the municipality. By keeping an open communication line with the locals, the positive image of New Boliden is spread. Next to that, schools, universities, and tourists can come and visit the mine, again keeping every process open to outsiders to learn.
In 2017 a test was started in Aitik with autonomous drilling. The machine is fully electric and up until now the outcomes look positive. This is one of the many projects Aitik is running to become the most modern mine in the world and therefore they stay creative and innovative.
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Wednesday 25-07-2018 – Rönnskär, New Boliden
On our third day we will visit the copper smelter in Rönnskär. It is a long ride in the morning, but then we will see one of the world's most efficient copper smelters.
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New Boliden – Copper Smelter Rönnskar The copper and lead concentrates are shipped to Boliden’s smelter in Rönnskär, while the zinc concentrate is shipped to Boliden’s Kokkola and Odda smelters in Finland and Norway, respectively, and to other smelters on the European mainland. In the past the Boliden ore was exported to be processed abroad, due to limited capacity of processing complex ores, Boliden decided to establish their own smelter in 1930. The smelter was mainly for processing the Boliden mine ores, but after is wat closed down it was adapted to process the company’s copper and lead concentrates as well as input from other mines.
Nowadays, the smelter produces lead, copper and zinc rich slag. The slag is transported further to be processes elsewhere. The smelter is one of the most efficient copper smelters in the world. The smelter also includes the largest facilities for recycling copper and precious metals.
Production process of primary flow The concentrates are firstly blended in order to obtain a constant feed for the smelter. A flash furnace is used for an initial step for the copper ore, upgrading it from 28 to 62% Cu matte. No fuel has to be added to the flash furnace, cause of the high sulphur content is reacting to the added oxygen creating enough heat. A total capacity of 80 tons can be reached within this furnace. The slag will be reprocessed in the electric furnace in combination with recycled process input. The Cu matte will be converted to the converter. This will upgrade to copper from 62 to 98% in a total capacity of 900 ton a day. The process is analysed partly by gasses and the colour of flames. A ratio of 2:1 of slag:matter is obtained, of which this slag will be returned to the electric furnace as well (process input). In order to obtain 99.99% pure copper, a continuous casting process will be used.
A fuming plant extracts the zinc from slag and steel mill dust. The reason of extraction from these sources is because the lead and zinc are vaporized in the fuming furnace by coal injection. The zinc will be upgraded to around 75% before exporting it to the Norzink zinc smelter. High purity lead is also produced in this location and cast into 42kg ingots.
Health, Safety, & Environment New Boliden is not only present in the actual mining of resources but also in the resource processing and refining as well. Ronnskar New Boliden is a smelting and refining facility, mostly focusing on copper. The safety culture at this location is present in every aspect of the facility. The smelting facility handles (molten) metal at extremely high temperatures and this is done with the highest consideration for the safety of the employees. This includes routine checks of the equipment, continuous monitoring and the use of safety gear. In addition, the facility was clean and easy to navigate which reduces work-time accidents like slips and falls.
The location of the plant is selected very deliberately, being located on a peninsula allows them to control everything that happens on the strip of land. This strip is exemplified by the fact that all rainwater is collected and processed for use in the facility, which is needed because of the presence of heavy metals and other dangerous and polluting substances. The facility is currently looking into making the smelting process produce less carbon dioxide with the use of hydrogen gas. This would make a carbon dioxide producing step from the refining procedure redundant.
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Sustainability & Efficiency Rönnskär has the largest recycler of electronic material in the world, named the Kaldo furnace. Annually it can recycle up to 120,000 tonnes of electronic scrap. Rönnskär tries to minimize their emissions and keeps a good relationship with the close by neighbourhood. During the copper making process, and especially in the last stage, a lot of still useable copper is present in the scrap. Rönnskär aims to minimize this copper los by putting the scrap in the PS converter to remelt the metals, so that it can be used again in the cycle.
The next project that is planned is a new leaching plant. This plant will enable the plant to extract more metals from residue materials and reduce waste volumes. A part of the waste is now stored in an underground bunker on the island itself. Plans are also made to enlarge this space.
Marketing & Innovation Just like the other operations New Boliden owns, Rönnskär keeps a very open communication line with the local community. They even go a step further by collecting the steam from the burned plastics from electronics and supplying this heat to the local heating system. Next to being very focussed on keeping the local community positive, they also strive to be known as an innovative e- scrap recycler.
Rönnskär is one of the leaders of the most efficient smelters in the world. By heavily investing in the Kaldo technology, new innovations for the recycling industry have been found. Because of the growing environmental awareness all around the globe, Rönnskär strives to find new ways of reducing emissions during the processes.
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Thursday 26-07-2018 – Svansele Wild Life Center, New Boliden
Today we are going to be visiting the wild life center of Svansele. We will be hosted by Boliden. Svansele hosts one of Swedens largest wilderness museums with over 600 taxidermied animals. All displayed in in rooms that look, feel and even smell like the wilderness. We will dine here in the evening with New Boliden.
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Friday 27-07-2018 – MEFOS, LKAB & Swerea
The last day of the first week we will spend at the pilot blast furnace from LKAB in Lulea. Here we will get a guided tour after which we will take the ferry to Småskär.
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Swerea Swerea is a Swedish research group for industrial renewal and sustainable development. Their task is to produce, develop and disseminate research results in the following areas: • Materials sciences • Manufacturing engineering • Product engineering With a regional, national and international presence, Swerea is a central part of the Swedish innovation system. Interaction with academia, industry and society is fundamental to the group's operations.
They work with applied research to give the industry competitive advantage, greater innovativeness and profitability in a sustainable society and has five wholy owned research institutes: Swerea IVF, Swerea KIMAB, Swerea MEFOS, Swerea SWECAST and Swerea SICOMP.
Swerea AB is owned jointly by the Swedish state and Swedish industry. The Swedish state owns 42,8% of Swerea via RISE, Research Institutes of Sweden AB. The remaining shares are held by the owner associations: • Stiftelsen Svensk Järn- och Metallforskning (19,8%) • Swerea IVF’s intressentförening (Swerea IVF's industry group) (11,8%) • MEFOR − Metallurgiska Forskningsbolaget i Luleå AB (11,2%) • Svenska Gjuteriföreningen (Swedish Foundry Association) (8,2%) • Intressentföreningen för korrosionsforskning (Interest Association for Corrosion Research) (6,2%)
MEFOS At MEFOS they create, refine and convey research results in process metallurgy, heating, metalworking, the environment and energy technology. The customers are found in the steel, iron, alloy and base metal industries as well as among environmental companies and equipment suppliers.
One of the projects is the CO2 reduction from the iron and steel industry. A pilot-plant facility was built in 2015 at Swerea MEFOS in Luleå, where a series of trials will be conducted during the course of the project. Gas from SSAB's blast furnace will be delivered to the pilot plant via a pipeline. Swerea MEFOS part of the project is EUR 7.6 million and mainly consist of: • Design and construction of a pilot plant, that processes 800 nm3/h blast furnace gas. • Pilot plant operation • Theoretical integration and optimisation of the process into the steel plant • A 500 m pipeline is built from SSAB to Swerea MEFOS The Stepwise project has the potential to reduce global carbon dioxide emissions by 2.1 Gton/year, based on current emissions levels.
Swerea MEFOS conducts large scale research and development in its own facilities. The capacity of the pilot equipment for metallurgical processes is in the order of three to six tonnes, for processing rolling mills and forging pressures it is even up to 500 tons of power, heating furnaces 3 tons/h and includes: - Metallurgical equipment for most known processes of reduction, melting and casting. - Processing engineering equipment for melting, heating, strip and rod rolling, and grinding. - Equipment for dust and gas cleaning that meets environmental standards.
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Health, Safety, & Environment The combination of MEFOS, LKAB and Swerea enable the companies to combine their health and safety regulations. Inside the facility there are several safety regulations introduced to employees to prevent any accident from happening. There are also briefings, meetings and trainings to reduce hazards.
Sustainability & Efficiency The collaboration between LKAB and Swerea shows the drive for sustainability and efficiency of LKAB. By testing new methods, slags and temperatures for steelmaking in the small pilot blast furnace from swerea, they can do research for better products, without letting this influence the normal production. But, not only do they (swerea) have collaborations with LKAB, they also work together with other companies in order to optimize their metallurgical processes or do research on other fields of interest.
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Since the pilot blast furnace at MEFOS is around a tenth of a normal sized pilot blast furnace, the losses of steel due to the testing are also less than normally. This makes it more efficient, since one is able to perform more tests with the same amount of pellet usage.
Due to the ever more awareness of climate change, Swerea is also now looking into new ways of recycling and separating waste to lift the recovery rate of for example metals. This is done by lasers that are currently developed and optimized, which have already been proven to work.
Marketing & Innovation The combination of these three companies is at the cutting edge of innovation in the resource processing, we visited their site at the end of July which meant that there was no activity at the site. This allowed us to take an extensive tour if their testing facilities. These facilities made it possible to really test some new production methods in smaller scale. Because of this, a process can be optimized in such a way that it consumes less energy.
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Weekend
Friday the 27th of July The first week has passed already. On Friday we will take the ferry from Skelleftea to Småskär. Here we will overnight on a private island from the scouting group in this area. There are possibilities to swim, row, sit in the sauna and barbecue.
Saturday the 28th of July Today we will take the ferry back to skelleftea just before dinner. From here we will drive to Lulea, where we will stay the night at City Sleep Hostel.
Sunday the 29th of July In the morning we will fly to Arlanda, Stockholm. Here we will pick up the rentals and then drive to Hammar, where we will stay the night.
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Monday 30-07-2018 –Metso and Sala Silver Mine
The first company visit in middle Sweden is Metso!
After Metso we will visit the Sala Silver mine. For 400 years the mine was the most important silver producer in Sweden, and one of the five most significant silver deposits in the world. In total 450 tons of silver were extracted. The mine has been a large producer of other minerals too, such as lead and zinc. Nowadays it is a well know tourist attraction with guided tours, events and even a restaurant.
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Introduction Metso Minerals is a part of the larger Metso Corporation, which is a global industrial company offering equipment and services for the sustainable processing and flow of natural resources in the industries of mining, aggregation, recycling and process industries. Customers operate in mining, aggregates, oil, gas, pulp, paper, power generation and construction industries. Metso Corporation employs over 12,000 people in more than 50 countries and is based in Finland.
Metso Minerals is the global supplier of (mineral) processing equipment and services for the mining and construction industries, which makes approximately 78% of the revenue of the larger Metso Corporation. Most of the sales go to emerging markets, like South-America, which are overtaking Europe, which dominated sales previously.
History Metso Corporation was formed by the merging of the Finnish companies Valmet and Rauma. Valmet was specialised in equipment for the wood pulp industry, while Raume specialised in rock crushing and flow technology. When the company was acquired by Svedala Industri AB in 2001, mining became the focus of the company. Then Metso grew out to be one of the world’s largest suppliers for the process industry. In 2013 the wood pulp branch, Metso Paper, was split from the rest of Metso and turned into an independent company. This company was named Valmet after its origin.
Products The product line of Metso Minerals includes everything needed for a complete processing plant; crushing, screening, grinding, separation and conveying. Since Metso also works in the construction industry, they also offer mobile processing units. Metso also offers the service of performance-based maintenance contracts. Since the company has many offices all over the world, local service teams are always close to provide maintenance resulting in the highest efficiency and quality.
Besides the sale of these products, Metso offers to consult companies by making a concept study and pre-evaluation of a new project. This concept study includes rock testing, a comprehensive budget review, mining plan and comparative evaluations.
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Health, Safety, & Environment Metso prioritizes the health and safety of their employees. Next to that, it is also very important to them to insure the safety of customers and contractors. This is done by instructing everyone on health and safety regularly. The aim for the future is to create a safe environment with less than one accident per 1 million worked hours. Metso is constantly increasing their eco-efficiency by developing new energy saving methods. In the long run this creates less pollution and it will be more cost effective. Intern a lot of HSE activities are organized to create more awareness for the environment and so try to achieve the zero environmental incident title.
Sustainability & Efficiency Around 84% of the new R&D projects at Metso aim for higher environmental efficiency targets. This is resulting into less water and energy consumption, but also no environmental accidents in the past years. Since Metso Minerals must find different solutions for problems from different customers, they have developed an efficient way of thinking and working to help the customer as best as possible.
Marketing & Innovation Metso is specialised in the machinery for the mining industry (mainly the processing). The company is highly specialised in building this type of machinery. For every customer the machinery is custom made. The process of installation is viewed and supervised by Metso itself. Remarkable, the machinery sold, will be shipped out in pieces and assembled at place by their own staff. They ensure, if the right data is delivered, that the right machinery will be installed. Metso’s primary marketing strategy therefore is word of mouth advertising by their superb customer service. Every piece of machinery Metso produces is specifically designed to fit the customer's wishes and desires. It happens that the customer sends the wrong numbers in order to force another deal, but even then, smart innovation is delivered to suit the machinery needs for the desired processing. The company keeps innovating their existing products and are open to different tasks for the design of machinery for the mining processing.
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Tuesday 31-07-2018 – Garpenberg, New Boliden
Today we will be visiting Garpenberg. This is one of the world's most modern mines. It is also Sweden’s oldest mining area still in operation. Complex ores containing zinc, lead, silver, copper and gold are mined here.
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New Boliden – Garpenberg The company operates the oldest mining district, Garpenberg. The mining district has been in operation for around 800 years already, back in the days the district was mined for iron, but nowadays it also produces zinc, lead and silver.
Geology The Garpenberg deposit is characterised as a very complex and steeply dipping orebody. During the Svecokarelian orogeny (at1.9- 1.8 Ga), this deposit is deformed into the felsic to intermediate Svecofennian metavolcanic-metasedimentary back-arc deposits. This ore deposit is extensively intruded by the “early” and “late” granites. The early granites were formed in 1.95-1.86 Ga. The geology of Garpenberg is mainly rhyolitic pumice-breccia, underlain by rhyolitic ash-siltstones, intersected by small volcanic intrusions.
The mine is focussed on the 10-80-metre-thick (limestone-)marble deposit. The orebody is in a large syncline, where most ores have already been removed from tight folds on both syncline limbs. Exploration is currently towards larger structures within the syncline. The ore is characterised by a zinc grade between 4 and 4.5%, a lead grade around 2% and 150g/t silver.
Operating Performance The grinding process is updated in 1990’s by adding an autogenous grinder and a staged flotation. With this staged flotation, it was now able to treat talc rich ores. The first stage flotation yields a lead-copper product. The second float can separate the zinc to a concentration of 56%. The not separated mixture is then separated into a 70% lead and a 22% copper concentrate. The recovery factors reached with this process is 90% zinc, 77% lead, 77% silver, 72% Gold and 63% copper. The mining method used is cut and fill, where a dimension of 50 to 300 meter long by 15m wide is cut into slices of approximately 5 meter. After cutting plain or cemented tailings will be pumped in and drained off.
Health, Safety, & Environment Garpenberg New Boliden proved once again that safety is as much a part of the company as mining itself. All the employees were very responsible and always considered safety before anything else. A clean workplace is a safe workplace and at New Boliden this shows. The flotation plant was the cleanest plant we’ve seen on this trip. The safety culture did not stop when we went underground.
New Boliden Garpenberg has adopted remote controlled semi-automatic loaders which means that some parts of the actively mine areas of the mine do not have any workers present near the vehicles, but rather in the control centre at the underground offices. In addition to this, blasts are scheduled in between underground shift which ensures the safety of all underground workers.
The ore that was brought up to the surface was stored in special buildings because of the heavy minerals present in the ore. This way, the gases or other dangerous materials don’t poison the environment.
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Sustainability & Efficiency New Boliden’s Garpenberg is, as claimed by the company itself, one of the most modern mines in the world. This is seen when walking through Garpenberg itself. Lately they have introduced a new tracking system for all miners: mobilaris. With this new system, if one is missing before a blast is about to be executed, the control room can find in a very fast way the person in question and make sure he is brought above ground to not delay the blast. But not only persons can be tracked, also patterns and machines. This way, the mine can be optimized on many different aspects. This was all started in 2011, when New Boliden decided to invest heavily into the efficiency and sustainability of the mine.
In some of the work offices underground, loaders and cutters are operated from a distance. This reduces the health risk for the employees and makes the overall work environment more friendly. The plant is partly powered by water power. Same as for the Aitik mine, here, overflown water is recycled and put back into the circle. This way, only a little fraction of the minerals is lost.
Since the new plant was built around 2011, the old plant is now being dismantled. Mining business has been in this area for around 700 years, therefore the reclamation plan will focus on restoring the landscape, but to keep the historical mining influences.
Marketing & Innovation New Boliden’s Garpenberg main marketing signature is being the most modern mine in the world. The hauling is done remotely from the office in the mine. The ore is processed on location and transported to the Rönnskär smelter or other smelters in Scandinavian. The whole cycle is very efficient and tends to be as low in CO2 emission as possible. Companies from all over the world come to see this efficient, safe and futuristic way of mining.
The futuristic way of mining gives an increase in safety for the employer. Exploration is still done in order to expand the lifetime of the mine and to ensure the local job market. The whole processing line is monitored with corresponding efficiency and material grade in order to obtain a real time evaluation. The process is monitored by local people and people from different backgrounds. There local awareness is a key factor for the mine and the company itself.
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Wednesday 01-08-2018 – Gåsgruvan Limestone Quarry, SMA Minerals
Approaching the end of our visit we still have some nice companies to visit. Today we are going to visit the Limestone quarry Gåsgruvan from SMA Minerals.
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Background Information
SMA Mineral originated from another company called Juvéls Åkeri in Filipstad. This company was formed in 1932, but it was the acquisition of Gåsgruvan lime works in 1980 that lays the foundation of what is SMA Mineral today.
The main focus of SMA Mineral is limestone and limestone related materials. Limestone has been used in construction from 7.000 B.C as binding material in the floors of some Mediterranean structures. Ever since then, the use of limestone and related products has increased to the situation now where approximately 8,8 million tonnes of calcium carbonate are mined from Sweden each year with an additional 500.000 tonnes of dolomite being mined every year as well. The current range of applications has also extended significantly from agriculture to environmental management. The main use of limestone and dolomite is the manufacturing of cement which is where half the Swedish production used for.
Currently SMA Mineral actively produces 23 different products and has units in five different countries. Their two main products (limestone and dolomite) are quarried, crushed and ground until the appropriate fractions are reached for further processing. Below a table is given presenting a subgroup of their products along with their production method, uses and production location.
Product Production method Primary uses Location (if given) Dolomite Quarrying + Agriculture, paint and plastic - crushing + grinding industries quartz Quarrying + crushed Steel industry (chromium Ristimaa, Finland furnaces) Magnesium Slurry (from other Paper industry (bleaching agent) Falkenberg, Sweden hydroxide processes) Water treatment Kaipiainen, Finland quicklime Heating of crushed Iron and steel industry, - limestone paper/pulp production, water treatment, other mining processes Slaked lime Mixing of quicklime Water treatment, - (powder/paste) with water. Flue gas scrubbing, Construction KC binder Mixture of quicklime Specifically developed for ground - and cement stabilization
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Limestone Quarrying + Agriculture, gardening and the - crushing + grinding production of: Paper Paint Asphalt Bricks Concrete Various metals Crushed Crushing to Infrastructure and construction - aggregates different fractions either from gangue containing granite or from Limestone with granite additive. Calcined Heating of mineral Steelmaking (as flux/slag) - dolomite dolomite
Environmental sustainability is one of the main focusses of SMA Mineral as many of their products have a positive influence on the environment like the treatment of flue gasses and drinking water. Limestone is also a natural acid neutralizer and this property of limestone has uses in improving farm soil quality and sanitizing contaminated soils.
SMA Mineral is also big on health and safety as they are close to their target of having no occupational accidents resulting in more than four hours of absence and the high level of reporting of near accidents demonstrates that there is a strong awareness on the topic of health and safety throughout the organization.
Health, Safety, & Environment SMA Minerals is a company which focuses on the production of limestone and limestone-related products. SMA Minerals focuses on health and safety by giving the employees a clear platform to express concerns regarding safety issues. Risk assessment and risk observations are very important to make sure that accidents can be prevented, will be prevented.
When it comes to the environment, SMA Minerals is taking this in high regard. Behind the quarry we visited lies a lake where beavers have made their dam, which led to water coming into the production area of SMA Minerals. Unfortunately, SMA Minerals cannot do anything about this yet, since various environmental activists have been against the removal of the lake and the beavers. Besides the limestone (related) products SMA produces, they also produce waste material. This is sold as building material for roads to prevent any environmental risks when storing this material.
Sustainability & Efficiency SMA Minerals have a problem with dust, as limestone powder is very dusty. This means they water the roads regularly to prevent problems in the surrounding areas. Also, the mine is close to urban areas. Because of noise control there are a lot of people living close by without even knowing that there is a mine project close to them. Next to that SMA Minerals invests and supports the Algoland project, which is a project that aims to bind carbon dioxide that is released from the lime and cement industry to algae. Those algae can in turn be used as raw materials for chemicals and biofuels.
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Marketing & Innovation SMA Minerals aims to be the partner of choice for high-quality limestone products and try to provide added value in everything they do. The aim of the company is to listen to the customers to improve their activities even further. They try to listen to most of the suggestions made by their clients to make sure their company can deliver exactly what the customer needs.
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Thursday 02-08-2018 – Epiroc
The second last company visit will be to Epiroc. Epiroc, previously Atlas Copco, specializes in supplying rock excavation equipment for more than 140 years.
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Introduction Atlas Copco is a Swedish company which focuses on the production of industrial tools and equipment such as innovative compressors, construction and mining equipment, air treatment systems, power tools, vacuum solutions and assembly systems.
Recently Atlas Copco realised that there is always a better and more innovative way to enable growth. This resulted into the emersion of two separate groups of companies: Atlas Copco and Epiroc, where Epiroc will focus on mining and civil engineering costumers while Atlas Copco will strengthen its focus on industrial customers. The work to establish Epiroc, mostly consisting of paperwork and administration, has been finished in 2018. Although two separate paths will be followed in the future, the two companies still share common heritage of innovation and commitment to the success of the customers.
Together Epiroc and Atlas Copco have about 40.000 employees in more than 150 countries, which resulted in a revenue of about 116 billion SEK in 2017 from which about 35% was earned from mining and rock excavation operations.
As of today, Epiroc still has its headquarters in Stockholm, where the company is committed to bring sustainable productivity to its customers. Epiroc itself has a revenue of SEK 31.4 billion and has more than 13 000 employees serving customers in more than 150 countries. As of June 18th, 2018, Epiroc has been trading its shares on the main market.
The early days and the new chapter Atlas Copco, now Epiroc, was founded in 1873 as AB Atlas. The company initially worked with engines and railway cars. In the first half of the 20th century, also due to the First World War, the company moved towards the production of portable (air) compressors and pneumatic tools. After the Second World War, AB Atlas decided to merge with another Swedish company called Polar Atlas, which resulted in the name change to Atlas Copco in 1953. Ever since 1953 the industry got to work with the world-renowned Atlas Copco, but as mentioned before Atlas Copco decided to split into two different companies in 2018; Atlas Copco and Epiroc.
As said before Epiroc will focus on mining and civil engineering customers, which includes compressor technique, mining and rock excavation technique and construction technique. This makes Epiroc, even though it’s a relatively new company, a leading productivity partner in the industry.
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Economics and charity In the past 10 years Epiroc has almost doubled its global revenue, as can be seen in the graph (obtained from www.statista.com)
Figure 2: Global Revenue Atlas Copco 2007-2017 in SEK
Epiroc isn’t using all the money for its own benefit. In 1984 the company has created the Water for All project, which builds infrastructures for clean drinking water in countries in need worldwide. It is driven by its employees and financed by the employees as well as the company.
Products Epiroc will focus on mining and civil engineering customers, which means it develops, manufactures and markets a wide range of mining products and tools, such as but not limited to:
• Drill rigs and rock drills • Cable bolting rigs • Raiseboring machine • Drilling tools • Grinding equipment • Top hammer drilling tools • Underground loaders • Underground trucks
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Health, Safety, & Environment The assembly line was very clean and organized which is possibly the best ways to reduce work floor accidents. We spent time in the research facility of the company where we learned about new developments, such as remote controlled and automated vehicles. This removes the employees from the hazardous areas of the mine and thus reduces the likeliness of an accident to happen. We visited the assembly line for Epiroc’s drilling machines which get shipped across the globe. We also saw the assembly of multiple fully electronic drilling equipment, these trucks help improve the air quality in the mine while they are also better for the environment by not being dependent on fossil fuels.
Sustainability & Efficiency The sustainability and efficiency within Epiroc are clear. They aim to produce machines that can work properly for as long as they are needed. Especially efficiency is important because they have lots of orders and the efficiency in the production line therefore has to be good. Also, the efficiency of the machines themselves needs to be perfect. This is the highest priority for Epiroc, to make the machine work as good as possible in the mine they are going to.
Marketing & Innovation Epiroc markets itself as the best in mining equipment, from drill rigs to air supply, and maintenance. The company focuses on high quality and good relationships with customers. This is achieved by keeping close contact with the customers and helping with the design and ensemble process.
Epiroc is working hard on the automatization of mining equipment, which is the most requested product in the mining industry now. However, it is also incredibly hard to get it to work properly, because of the precise timing in the transport process in the mines, but also to implement the new machinery into the not yet fully automated mines. They are working on 5G systems below ground, track and trace systems, and automatic shuffle machinery.
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Friday 03-08-2018 – Zinkgruvan, LundinMining As we are approaching the end of the study trip, it is time for the last company visit: LundinMining. We will visit the Zinkgruvan near Askersund. After the guided tour we will leave for Stockholm.
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Lundin Mining: Zinkgruvan mine and processing plant Location: 250 km SW of Stockholm in south- central Sweden; 15 km from Askersund. Owner: 100 percent owned by Lundin Mining Corporation. Products: Zinc concentrate (Sphalerite); Lead-Silver concentrate (Galena); Copper concentrate (chalcopyrite, as of 2010 ). Type of mining: Longhole stoping and penal stoping at 800 – 1130 meters below surface. Production rate (ores): 18,958 tonnes of Zinc in third quarter of 2017. 7,899 tonnes of Lead in third quarter of 2017. Concentrate properties: 54% Zn; 75% Pb. Employees: 340 + 100 contractors Cash costs per pound: $ 0.35/lb Zn.
Introduction LundinMining is a diversified Canadian base metals mining company with operations in Chile, the United States of America, Portugal, and Sweden, primarily producing copper, nickel and zinc. The Zinkgruvan Mine is owned and operated by Zinkgruvan Mining AB which is a 100% indirect subsidiary of Lundin Mining. It is located 200 km southwest of Stockholm in south central Sweden. The mine site is approximately 15 km from the town of Askersund and consist of a deep underground mine, a processing plant and associated infrastructure and tailings disposal facilities.
Concentrates are trucked from the mine to the inland port of Otterbäcken on Lake Vänern from where they are shipped via canal and sea to European smelter customers. Lake Vänern, the largest lake in Sweden, is 100 km distant and provides access to coastal shipping via a series of inland canals and the port of Göteborg. The mine currently holds five exploration concessions in the area totaling 5,700 ha.
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Background information: History The Zinkgruvan deposit has been known since the 16th century, but it was not until 1857 that large scale production was carried out under the ownership of the Belgian company Vieille Montagne. The earliest records of mining activities in the area dates from 1700. This was from the Isåsa mine, located to the north of the present Zinkgruvan operation. This mine operated until 1845, since it was shut down because it never made any profit.
In 1846 there was interests in the Zinkgruvan area as a potential zinc producer. Mining and smelting were carried out but because of the large quantities of coal needed for reducing the ore the operation was again not profitable.
The Swedish owner of the property subsequently made contact with Vieille Montagne, the world leader in the mining and processing of zinc ores at that time. The Belgian company agreed to purchase the properties, including mineral rights and extensive surface rights in farm and forest land. The first shipment of ore from Zinkgruvan to Belgium was made in 1860. Vieille Montagne metallurgists, accustomed to treating oxidised ores in carbonate gangues, encountered severe technical problems in smelting the sulphide ores; however, the problem was eventually solved by the addition of a roaster on site in 1864.
The initial processing plant for these operations from the 1850s to the late 1970s was in Åmmeberg on the shores of Lake Vättern with ore transported approximately 5 km from the mine site by narrow gauge railway and from there transported to Belguim. The former tailings area now forms a golf course.
In 1990, Vieille Montagne merged into Union Miniere of Belgium, and in 1995, North Australia acquired the Zinkgruvan Mine. In August 2000, Rio Tinto became the owner of the mine following its acquisition of North Australia. In June 2004, Lundin Mining purchased the mine from Rio Tinto and is until now owner of the mine.
Geology The Zinkgruvan deposit is in the southern part of the Bergslagen province of south-central Sweden. The province comprises a Proterozoic aged (1.9 giga-annum or Ga) greenstone belt and hosts massive Zn-Pb, Cu and Ag sulphide ores and banded iron formations. The supracrustal rocks are dominated by felsic metavolcanics successions with limestones and calcsilicates commonly found within the metavolcanics.
The Zinkgruvan deposit comprises a stratiform, massive Zn-Pb deposit situated in an east-west striking synclinal structure within the lower Proterozoic Svecofennian supracrustal sequence (1.90 Ga - 1.88 Ga). The deposit exhibits distinctive stratification and extends for more than 5,000 m along strike and to depths of 1,600 m. The orebody thickness ranges from 3 to 40 m. In the central part of the deposit the zinc-lead mineralisation is stratigraphically underlain by a substratiform copper stockwork.
One sub-vertical fault splits the ore deposit in to two major parts, the Knalla mine to the west and the Nygruvan mine to the east. In the Nygruvan mine the dip is 60° - 80°, whilst in the Knalla mine folding is extensive and partly isoclinal. The Zinkgruvan orebodies are dominated by sphalerite and galena and are generally massive, well banded. The Zinkgruvan deposit consists of lenses of polymetallic (Zn, Pb, Ag (and Cu)) sulphides formed at or near the seafloor in submarine hot spring environments. They were formed from accumulations of the focussed discharges of metal-enriched
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Mining & Processing methods Zinkgruvan is an underground mine with a long history. Mine access is currently via three shafts, with the principal P2 shaft providing hoisting and man access to the 800 m and 850 m levels with the shaft bottom Annual Information Form 2018 40 at 900 m. A ramp connecting the underground workings with surface was completed in 2010 and now provides vehicle access direct to the mine. A system of ramps is employed to exploit estimated Mineral Reserves below the shaft and the deepest mine level is now at approximately 1,250 m below surface.
The mine is highly mechanized and uses longhole primary secondary panel stoping in the Burkland area of the mine, and sublevel benching in the Nygruvan area and in the Cecilia area. Recently underhand panel stoping has been introduced to the lower sections of the Burkland and Nygruvan orebodies. All stopes are backfilled with either paste tailings and cement or waste rock.
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The processing plant is located adjacent to the P2 shaft. The run-of-mine zinc/lead ore is milled in two single stage closed-circuit grinding mills. A bulk flotation stage is followed by lead-zinc separation in the cleaner flotation section to produce separate zinc and lead concentrates. The concentrates are thickened and filtered and then stockpiled under cover.
Metallurgical recoveries average approximately 90% for zinc and 82% for lead. Tailings are pumped some 4 km to a dedicated tailings impoundment from which decant water is returned to the process. Metallurgical recoveries of copper average 90%. Zinc, lead and copper concentrates from the mine are sold to a variety of European smelters. Multi-year sales contracts are normally agreed upon with customers and treatment, refining and penalty charges are typical of those for zinc, lead and copper sulphide concentrates. The lead concentrates are particularly high grade and contain elevated levels of silver.
Health, Safety, & Environment Health and safety are of paramount importance at LundinMining, both for their contractors as their own employees. Their believe is that all occupational issues and work-related illnesses are preventable. The aim of their ‘Zero Harm’-project is to send everybody home safely every shift, every day. Additionally, LundinMining provides occupational health services to their employees through on-site clinics or through contacted mobile services.
LundinMining develops their projects in such a way that the environmental impact is minimized and the eventual closure at the end of the project is also considered. Water, energy and other resources are used efficiently, and the waste is responsibly managed. The conservation of biodiversity is contributed to by promoting research, partnerships and responsible land management practices.
Sustainability & Efficiency LundinMining have a large underground area to cover, that is why they spend a lot of their money in exploration and connections to make the system as efficient as possible. They are working on an underground train network to transport all material as fast as possible. They have a system to keep all minerals in their own process, all spilled material will later be refed at the start of the system even though not all minerals are produced.
Where most other processing plants have discarded their old machineries, LundinMining has kept a few of their older machines. They have optimized the performance and still use them. This is an example of the importance of reusing materials instead of making or using a new one.
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Marketing & Innovation The Zinkgruvan mine is part of Lundin Mining. As a bigger mining corporation, it is easier and more efficient selling self-processed products. The company has several local events for the community, such as a mining run and coming year they will organize a cycling tour as well. The benefits of these activities are that people create more positive memories with Lundin Mining in mind. By hiring contractors from the local community, it benefits the local economy and it costs less for the company, because employees are already feeling at home.
Zinkgruvan has developed a new mining method based on a higher stress and turnover rate, this method is called drift and bench mining or “underhand mining” in short. This mining method has a lower development stage and turnovers are generated earlier. This made it possible to mine lower grade zones as well, because of this the main focus was not only on high grade zones.
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Saturday 04-08-2018 Today we hope the weather is nice, because we are going to explore Stockholm! The whole day you are free to plan as you wish.
Sunday 05-08-2018 Sadly, we arrived at the final day of the excursion. In the morning there is still some time to explore Stockholm, but since our flight departs at 16:30 we must leave for the airport shortly after the lunch.
Program 13:00 Departure Stockholm 16:30 Take off Arlanda, Stockholm 18:30 Landing in Schiphol, Amsterdam 20:00 Delft Central Station
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