Suitable Underground Mining Method Selection Using EEM and PROMETHEE: A Case Study of a Glauberite Mine

Abstract

Underground Mining Method Selection (UMMS) is the first stage and the most important problem in mining design. Selecting the suitable mining method among many alternatives is a multi-criteria decision-making problem. To apply decision making theory for Mining Method Selection (MMS) problem, researchers have faced two difficulties in recent years: (i) calculation of relative weight for each attributes, (ii) uncertainty in judgment for decision makers. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate the implementation of an integrated approach that employs expert evaluation method (EEM) and preference ranking organization method for enrichment evaluation (PROMETHEE) together for selecting the most suitable mining method in the Glauberite Mine. Mining method selection depends on some parameters, such as geological and geotechnical properties, economic parameters and geographical factors. This problem includes seven possible mining methods and eleven attributes to evaluate them. These attributes include shape of deposit, slope of orebody, thickness of orebody, depth below the surface, grade distribution, hanging wall RMR, orebody RMR, recovery, dilution, mining cost and annual productivity. Firstly, we calculated the weights of these attributes using the expert evaluation method (EEM). A simple case study has also been presented to illustrate the competence of this method. Here, we compared the seven mining methods for a Glauberite mine and selected the optimal mining method using PROMETHEE method. Finally, the Block stoping method was selected as the most suitable method to this mine. The results have shown that the proposed integrated method can be successfully used in solving mining engineering problems.