Report on IntegratedMinPro '22

Integration, Optimisation & Design of Mineral Processing Circuits ’22 was MEI’s first conference on this theme and was sponsored by Promet101 and Hudbay Minerals. Our Media Partner was International Mining, and our Industry Advocates were the Coalition for Eco-Efficient Comminution (CEEC), Cornwall Mining Alliance and the Critical Minerals Association.

Following is a brief summary of this two day online event. The recordings of the 17 presentations will be available on demand for 6 months, so it is not too late to register.

Monday June 13th

MEI’s Amanda and Jon Wills welcomed the 27 delegates from 12 countries to this small conference, noting that as we enter the 4th industrial revolution, the 'green' revolution, mineral processing is recognised as one of the most important technologies in satisfying the increasing demand for all metals, particularly those that are critical in the manufacture of renewable energy sources, and for electric vehicles. 

There are tremendous challenges facing mineral processors, and at last month's Physical Separation '22 panel discussion, it was noted that processes such as gravity, flotation and magnetic separation will need to be integrated more in future as ores become more complex, and how mineral processing will evolve in the future will be the subject of the papers at this conference and at the final day’s panel discussion. 

As the demand for resources continues to increase, and amidst growing challenges of processing complex ores while minimising energy and environmental impact, we are entering an exciting time for innovation in mineral processing and in this morning's keynote lecture, Elizabeth Lewis-Gray of Gekko Systems Integrated Mineral Processing, Australia, discussed the critical need for accelerating innovation in the mining sector, highlighting  the difficulties involved in  getting permits and the social licence to operate especially given climate change and the energy intensity of the mining industry.

Elizabeth said that Gekko Systems has always had a particular focus on reducing energy intensity and increasing energy efficiency. This has resulted in a focus on new flowsheets, pre-concentration, reducing treatment of gangue/waste, utilising low energy technologies as well as being instrumental in the establishment of one of our industry advocates, CEEC International. Increasingly, mining companies are looking to reduce their energy footprint and to utilise renewable / low carbon energy sources which will place further pressure on designing low energy and flexible mineral processing facilities. 

The capacity to successfully deliver new innovation is still problematic for the mineral processing sector and the mining industry, which still has many barriers including high capital investment risk, low risk profile of engineers by nature, influence of investors, etc. Many mineral processing flowsheets  are designed to minimise risk not energy. Timelines/budgets no longer allow for pilot studies. The sector must find new pathways to accelerate collaboration, knowledge sharing and innovation and a number of new pathways to market are being trialled and established. However, it is also critical for the innovation to take place across the whole value chain of mining to eliminate waste and maximise efficiency – including accessing and sharing data across the pillars of geology, mining and metallurgy.

Elizabeth’s keynote provided the perfect base for the 9 presentations that followed. Authors from Australia, Chile and Iran discussed wide ranging topics, including reducing water and energy consumption, the integration of mineral processing skill sets and processes, and process simulation and automation.

The presentations and the associated abstracts can be viewed on the conference website.

Tuesday June 14th

The presentations on the final day had the general theme of computer methods to optimise and simulate mineral processing operations.  The day began with a keynote presentation by Dr. Osvaldo Bascur, Principal of OSB Digital, and consultant Fellow to SEEQ, USA.

Ores are becoming extremely variable with mineralogy and hardness disturbing the integrated crushing, grinding, flotation, and thickening processes. The current mining, comminution and flotation sensors provide large amounts of data for process optimization. To augment the operational knowledge for proactive actions for improving the performance of the integrated rock processing complexes, Dr. Bascur showed how the right process knowledge context and operational modes need to be added. Without these proper operational contexts in place, the results are unmanaged downtime, process troubles, maintenance interruptions, and unmet production schedules. By measuring operational modes and managing these unproductive times (trouble times), new ways of improving profitability and efficiency of the plant can be found. He explained how real-time analytics enables calculation of metal recovery in real time and how predictive analytic models to secure the best operating conditions based on the type of ore currently mined have been developed. Using the latest advanced analytics, machine learning, big data analytics tools and cloud computing enables the creation of new workflows and collaboration between mining, concentrator plants, and the enterprise, including services providers.

Following Osvaldo’s keynote were 6 presentations from Australia, Morocco and the USA, describing machine learning algorithms for flotation and blending; a new flowsheet-based simulation system; optimisation to reduce water and energy consumption; and optimisation to improve circuit performance.

Prior to the afternoon break, Stuart Saich, of conference sponsor Promet101, chaired a live panel discussion on the continuing evolution of mineral processing. Delegates submitted questions to the panelists, today’s keynote speaker Osvaldo Bascur, Dr. Stephen Rayward of MIDAS Tech International, Australia and Dr. Diego Mesa of Imperial College, UK, and Aminpro, Chile.

Unfortunately Stuart was not able to initially connect, but Stephen kindly took over at the last minute as chairman, until Stuart jumped in 15 minutes into the session, which promoted some active debate over a range of topics.

In winding up the conference Jon thanked everyone involved, the sponsors, presenters and delegates, and invited everyone to attend the next conference in the series, which is planned to be held in Falmouth, back to back with Physical Separation ’24, in June 2024.

Finally a reminder that the recordings of the presentations and the panel discussion are available on demand, so it is not too late to register for the conference.

@barrywills