Application of fuzzy linear programming for short-term planning and quality control in mine complexes

Abstract

A strategic mine plan sets the overall objectives of a mining project. Mine planning is a multidisciplinary process and its aim is to develop the life-of-mine extraction plan to meet some predefined goals (Dagdelen, 2007;Henderson and Turek, 2013). Mine plans are classified into long-, medium-, and short-term plans. Normally, these plans are organized such that the mining operations achieve the highest cash flow or net present value (Heureux, Gamache, and Soumis, 2013;Juarez et al., 2014;King, 2014). These plans should consider capacities, blending requirements, block sequencing, reclamation requirements, pit slope, and any other constraints that may exist in each particular mine site (Caccetta and Hill, 2003).However, many problems in the field of mining engineering are characterized by insufficient and incomplete data. The stochastic and uncertain nature of geological, technological, market, political, and ecological factors are inherent in the context of mining engineering. For example, the dynamic change of ore and waste material due to the presence of spatial grade uncertainty makes predictions of the optimal mining sequence a challenging task (Godoy and Dimitrakopoulos, 2004;Azimi, Osanloo, and Esfahanipour, 2013;Rahmanpour and Osanloo, 2016a). These uncertainties highlight the importance of careful and risk-based mine planning through the development of new production planning models (Osanloo, Gholamnejad, and Karimi, 2008;Newman et al., 2010).Long-term plans outline the strategies to achieve a company's goals (the highest net present value, for instance). Short-term plans are aimed at following the strategies of the long-term plan, and the other objective of short-term plans is to minimize operating costs as much as possible. For this purpose, engineers try to find a reliable system with minimal cost (Levitin and Lisnianski, 2001;Rahmanpour and Osanloo, 2016b). Modern and successful production systems are characterized by high productivity, full utilization of resources, flexibility, and reliability. These characteristics enable an operating system to adapt to changing conditions. In any mining operation, ore is mined from different blocks and is hauled to predetermined destinations based on its chemical or mineralogical properties. Mining operations obtain the desired quality of the plant feed by blending ore of different qualities. The same practice is applied in a mine complex where the ore is sourced from different mines and has different chemical and physical characteristics (Figure 1).Since ore properties can vary considerably, blending is a prerequisite in order to obtain a consistent feed to the processing plant. The run-of-mine quality depends on the quality and quantity of ore mined from each face. Uncertainty is the state of having limited knowledge to perform a task. During feasibility studies, the precise values of all the input parameters are not known. Normally, Application of fuzzy linear programming for short-term planning and quality control in mine complexes by M. Rahmanpour and M. Osa...

Truck dispatching in surface mines -Application of fuzzy linear programming

“…The fuzzy set theory was first applied in the field of mining engineering in the late 1980s by Nguyen (1985), Chattopadhyay (1986), andBandopadhyay (1987). Since then, it has been extensively applied in decisionmaking models for mine planning (Rahmanpour and Osanloo, 2017), equipment selection and sizing (Bascetin, Oztas, and Kanli, 2007;Aghajani Bazzazi, Osanloo, and Soltanmohammadi, 2008), plant location selection (Yavuz, 2008), and post-mining land use and reclamation (Bangian et al, 2012). The application of fuzzy set theory in conventional linear programming resulted in the generation of fuzzy linear programming (FLP).…”

“…The application of fuzzy set theory in conventional linear programming resulted in the generation of fuzzy linear programming (FLP). The first implementations of FLP are credited to Zimmermann (1976Zimmermann ( , 1978 and Madadi and Wong (2014), and the latest application in the mining context can be found in Rahmanpour and Osanloo (2017). In this paper, we apply the concept of fuzzy set theory, using FLP, to solve our developed model for the truck dispatching problem in surface mines.…”

Production Strategy Optimization of Integrated Exploitation for Multiple Deposits Considering Carbon Quota

“…Rahmanpour and Osanloo formulated a fuzzy linear programming model to optimize short-term mine production planning. The optimal scheme was provided to determine the amount of material that needs to be mined from each site [25]. Gligorić et al implemented a mathematical model in a small hypothetical lead-zinc mineral deposit, which demonstrated that it could define the sequence of mining of different areas by quantifying the metal price and operating costs of mining [26].…”