Case Study
Blast movement modelling with OREPro™ 3D
31 Oct 2023
Site Profile
Touquoy Mine is located approximately 80km north- east of Halifax, Nova Scotia Canada, and is operated by St Barbara Ltd, Atlantic Operations. The mine is a small open-pit with an average ore grade of 0.90g/t. The ore body is structurally controlled and often discontinuous over short distances; due to these small ore zones, blasting ore and waste separately was often impossible or impractical. Ore loss and dilution have a significant impact on the quality and quantity of ore delivered to the mill, as such it is critical that mining is conducted as accurately as possible.
The situation
In 2019 the mine operation moved from blasting 5m benches to 10m benches, mining 2 x 5m flitches which reduced blasting costs by approximately 30%. However, without the ability to customise blast shapes according to the ore formations on each flitch, there was an increase of ore loss and dilution. Despite best efforts by the team at St Barbara to track blast movement, dilution increased from 6.5% to 8.7%.
Technical solutions
To improve their understanding of blast movement, the team at St Barbara was keen to start exploring available technologies. In response, Orica Digital Solutions proposed to implement OREPro™ 3D and held demonstrations to illustrate how the software could assist operations.
“We compared the pros and cons of OREPro 3D against our current processes, such as drone videos, surveys, blast movement indicators or visual inspection of muck piles, and other commercially available solutions. We determined that OREPro 3D could lead to a substantial improvement in our mining accuracy, and the technology was safer, faster and substantially less expensive than its competitors.”
— Drew Pelley, Superintendent Mine Geology
In addition to providing the software, St Barbara were also given customised training, access to the OREPro™ 3D Edu learning modules, and on-demand support.
The result
St Barbara operations reported the benefits of OREPro™ 3D as being two-fold; a significant reduction in dilution, and ore loss.
“We used OREPro 3D on 33 blasts over the first 12 months, for those blasts we increased grade by 7% and decreased dilution by 6.5% when compared to our previous systems. As a result, we increased revenue by $1million from these blasts. These numbers are even more impressive if you consider that we are a mill limited operation. By reducing waste through the crusher by 6.5% we were able to feed additional material from the stockpile, increasing revenue by another $1.1million.”
— Drew Pelley, Superintendent Mine Geology.
Orica Digital Solutions wishes to thank St Barbara Ltd, Atlantic Operations for their support and permission to publish this case study.
Author: Enzo Angeles
"Blasting ore and waste separately will always be the gold standard for minimising ore loss and dilution, however it's not always practical to do so. For those situations, OREPro 3D is by far the best solution and I would recommend it to anyone working in an open-pit environment."
— Drew Pelley, Superintendent Mine Geology
$2.1m revenue increase
Used on 33 blasts over 12 months, increasing grade by 7% and decreasing dilution by 6.5%, resulted in a revenue increase of $1 million. Additionally, revenue was increase by another $1.1 million by reducing waste through the crusher by 6.5% which allowed additional material to be fed from the stockpile.
Improved accuracy
Proven by St Barbara, OREPro™ can lead to substantial improvement in mining accuracy, using safer, faster and economically viable technology.
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