Energy Efficiency · September 2019
Energy Efficiency Opportunities at Red Chris
Energy benchmarking and modelling of the Red Chris SAG, ball mill and regrind circuits to find energy conservation opportunities.
- Project
- Red Chris mill
- Location
- Northern British Columbia, Canada
- Application
- Energy efficiency
- Samples
- SAG, ball mill and regrind circuit surveys
- Compared against
- Energy benchmarks, alternative flowsheets
PaperA Summary of Energy Efficiency Opportunities for the Red Chris Comminution Circuits · SAG Conference 2019, Vancouver
Read the paperContext
The Red Chris mill in Northern British Columbia processes copper-gold ore. The study looked for energy conservation opportunities in the SAG and ball mill circuit and in the regrind circuit.
The Work
Mill surveys were used to calibrate mill models, such as those in JKSimMet, and simulate alternative operating scenarios. Every circuit, including the Vertimill regrind circuit, was energy benchmarked, with Eliason laboratory stirred mill tests for the regrind circuit.
The options evaluated included SAG mill charge monitoring to allow lower mill speed, sending pebble crusher product to the ball mill circuit, sensor-based sorting of pebble crusher feed and changes to media size.
Results
Flexibility in the material handling system allowed alternative flowsheets to be assessed for the SAG and ball mill circuits. In the regrind circuit, surveys and benchmarking showed that the Vertimill separating tank was ineffective as a size classifier.
