RE: Value in the ground19 Nov 2019 11:55
And to add Paddy
At its Cadia mine in Australia, Newcrest has dug down more than 1 km (0.6 miles) to access the orebody column above, which is twice the height of any other block cave in the world, Biswas said.
Ensuring the method is successful with the tallest ore bodies requires specialist engineering, a type of rock preconditioning in which natural flaws are exploited to destress the rock and make it stay in shape, as well as plenty of computing heft, he said.
"Imagine this big block a kilometre high, we can now find out which way the rocks are moving in there. We put sensors in, which give us a ping now and then as to where they are and we can actually track the rock movements through that entire block right down."
More data and more computing power were driving innovation and savings throughout the industry, he said.
"It's going in leaps and bounds literally as we speak."
So being deep is not a problem with the expertise of Newcrest