Highlights

This project was inclusive of conceptual, feasibility, and detailed engineering for a lump-sum supply of a turnkey tailings dewatering project. It included a modular filter plant, housing a single CX5-80 ceramic disc vacuum filter, and all ancillary equipment (tanks, piping, MCC) to ensure proper functionality of the system.
This project allowed for the transition from traditional slurried tailings deposition to sub-serial placement of filtered tailings and generation of a stockpile of suitable materials for use as backfill in the underground mine.
The project signifies the mine's commitment to environmental responsibility through modern filtration technology and adoption of filtered tailings.

Challenge

Due to difficult terrain and seismic activity, expanding the tailings facilities wasn’t possible. The client needed a solution in less than a year to avoid impacting mill concentrator capacity due to storage space shortage. We handled detailed engineering and project execution, supplying a modular plant to speed up commissioning. Fabrication and construction occurred during the pandemic, so we used new wearable devices/software for remote field-acceptance-tests and quality assurance.

 

Solution

We implemented an integrated tailings dewatering plant, inclusive of one CX5-80 (80 m2) ceramic disc vacuum filtration system for use in dewatering of the flotation copper tailings produced by this underground mining operation in southwestern Colombia.

 

Benefit

This project development strategy permitted the operation to transition to sub-aerial placement of filtered tailings far quicker than a traditional stick-built plant would have taken to construct. Implementation of new software solutions allowed for remote fabrication and construction quality assurance, as well as monitoring of performance of the plant post-commissioning.