Unprecedented cooling for Bauxite mine helps avoid shutdown
Unprecedented cooling for Bauxite mine helps avoid shutdown
Aggreko provided a rapid cooling solution for a bauxite mine in Queensland, Australia, to replace the dry dam and avoid mine downtime. The solution involved deploying heat rejection packages in an unprecedentedly quick response time, ensuring that production at the mine continued without any interruption.
- The Challenge
Find rapid cooling to replace dry dam and avoid mine downtime
- The Impact
No downtime, no drama - production at mine continues
- The Solution
Unprecedented quick response to devise and deploy heat rejection package
Client:Rio Tinto
Location:Queensland, Australia
Sectors:Mining
The Challenge
Find rapid cooling to replace dry dam and avoid mine downtime
A bauxite mine in Queensland, Australia, was exporting more than 23 million tonnes per year. This level of productivity required high levels of efficiency across the entire mine process. Downtime was not an option.
Drought season had left its mark on the nearby dam serving the mine site and its operations – the dam was projected to run dry by the end of the calendar year. This would leave production curtailed or at worst – stopped altogether.
The artesian water that sprang naturally could not be used as it leaves the ground at a scorching 80 degrees centigrade. This temperature would degrade the existing poly piping system so much that it would need to be replaced in a year, rather than its expected lifecycle of 50 years.
Rio Tinto needed a solution to not only cool the artesian water thoroughly, but they needed that solution delivered and deployed quickly. There aren’t any cooling specialists that can offer such a mobile, modular and rapid answer.
Aside from Aggreko.
Drought season had left its mark on the nearby dam serving the mine site and its operations – the dam was projected to run dry by the end of the calendar year. This would leave production curtailed or at worst – stopped altogether.
The artesian water that sprang naturally could not be used as it leaves the ground at a scorching 80 degrees centigrade. This temperature would degrade the existing poly piping system so much that it would need to be replaced in a year, rather than its expected lifecycle of 50 years.
Rio Tinto needed a solution to not only cool the artesian water thoroughly, but they needed that solution delivered and deployed quickly. There aren’t any cooling specialists that can offer such a mobile, modular and rapid answer.
Aside from Aggreko.
30DegreesAverage dry bulb temperature in area
6monthFrom desktop to deploy
66.9MWHeat rejection capacity
23 Milliontonnesof bauxite produced by mine annually