Services provided by this group include:
Mineral resource evaluation
- Review, classification and gap-filling of existing data
- Statistical analysis to determine distributions and populations
- Geostatistics (variography, directional continuity, etc.)
- Block model dimensioning
- Compositing of existing data
- 3D geological modelling
- Geological sections in various directions and level plans
- Definition of mineralization zones and weighting of the resource accordingly
- Estimation of geological resources (measured, indicated and inferred) and average grade
- Reports with associated maps
Open-pit mine design
- Techno-economic feasibility studies
- Domestic and international market studies and price forecasting
- Fixed capital cost estimation for mine and plant
- Cut-off grade calculation to determine break-even production
- Economic parameters for defining the economic pit
- Sensitivity analysis of the optimal pit to price, mining costs and other factors
- Open-pit vs. underground boundary and optimal pit shell
- Overall slope, bench slope, height and width, and access ramps
- Open-pit reserves and mine life based on annual production
- Geometric pit design and division into pushbacks
- Mining phases and long- and short-term production scheduling
- Waste and ore stockpile siting, design and scheduling
- Blast design for working and final benches
- Estimation of machinery, equipment and materials for drilling, blasting, loading, hauling and dumping
- Manpower estimation and organization chart
- Ancillary and service equipment estimation
- Open-pit mining plans for life-of-mine and year-end, with volume estimates
- Open-pit mining plan reports and supervision of implementation
Underground mine design
- Selection of the most suitable underground mining method
- Final underground mining limits and orebody blocking
- Stope design based on geotechnical data and orebody geometry
- Mining parameters and production capacity for each stope
- Mining passports for the proposed method(s)
- Stope manpower and activity scheduling
- Dilution and ore-loss estimation
- Equipment and consumables for stopes
- Cut-off grade for underground mining
- Design of main and secondary development, with support passports
- Development volumes and consumables
- Drill-and-blast calculations and patterns for development
- Scheduling of construction and operation and optimal production capacity
- Haulage calculations and fleet selection:
- Within stopes
- In the main mine network
- Surface haulage
- Ventilation calculations for development and production, with equipment selection
- Compressed-air requirements and equipment selection
- Underground mining plan reports and supervision of implementation