Professional Development Course
Course Title: Optimizing the Strategic Mine Plan: Unlocking Intrinsic Value
Two Sessions: Canada and Ghana
IN-PERSON (CANADA)
Date: July 10 – 14, 2023 (5 days)
Time: 8:30am – 5:00pm, Eastern Standard Time (EST)
Location: Laurentian University Campus
Registration deadline: June 26th, 2023
Limit: 20 seats
- Course fee includes a 30-day GEOVIA WHITTLE software evaluation license
- Course fee includes a 30-day OptimalSlope software evaluation license
- Take note of registration deadlines as software dongles need to be couriered to you
- Training is in collaboration with West African Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum and Dassault Systemes
- Course fee includes catering for lunch and coffee breaks
Course Fee in CAD:
- Regular $3,200 (Before June 26th, 2023)
- Early Bird $3,000 (Before June 12th, 2023)
- Multi-person (≥2) $3,000 (Before June 12th, 2023)
IN-PERSON (GHANA)
Date: August 7 – 11, 2023 (5 days)
Time: 8:30am – 5:00pm, Greenwich Mean Time (GMT)
Location: Busua Beach Resort
Registration deadline: July 17th, 2023
Limit: 20 seats
- Course fee includes a 30-day GEOVIA WHITTLE software evaluation license
- Course fee includes a 30-day OptimalSlope software evaluation license
- Take note of registration deadlines
- Training is in collaboration with West African Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum and Dassault Systemes
- Course fee includes hotel accommodation and all meals
Course Fee in USD:
- Regular $3,200 (Before July 17th, 2023)
- Early Bird $3,000 (Before July 3rd, 2023)
- Multi-person (≥2) $3,000 (Before July 3rd, 2023)
COURSE OBJECTIVES & WHO SHOULD ATTEND
Learn how to improve your mine planning techniques by:
- Understanding the principal concepts of strategic mine planning and improving economic performance such as revenue and cost
- Exploring practical stochastic pit-limit optimization, pushback designs and mine-life estimation
- Determining optimal profiles for slopes and pitwalls
- Learning the principles and concepts of mathematical programming and its applications to integrated mine planning and waste management
- Knowing about open pit/underground mining options optimization
- Understanding mine production scheduling and its financial risk management
- Discovering practical implementation techniques in mine planning with grade, tonnage and metal uncertainty
- Exploring cut-off grades, stockpiling and waste management strategies
- Participating in hands-on computer labs on the applications of new optimization concepts
- Useful for mining, operations, project, and exploration managers, mine planners, mine engineers, geoscientists, geostatisticians, geologists, metallurgists, financial analysts, and directors
COURSE OUTLINE
Principal and fundamental concepts in open-pit limit optimization
- Strategic mine planning and economic performance
- Mining revenues and costs
- Pushbacks (phases) and ultimate pit limit optimization
- Practical pushback design with minimum mining width
- Optimal profiles for slopes and pitwalls (online guest lecture)
Principal and fundamental concepts in strategic mine planning optimization
- Life-of-mine production planning/scheduling
- Mine-life estimation
- Cut-off grade optimization and Lane’s theory
- Stockpiling strategy
- Directional mining control
- Simultaneous optimization of mining value chain
- Multi-mine multi-process production scheduling
- Mine-to-mill production planning
- Blending and non-linear recovery in processing streams
- Mine planning considerations for contract mining
Strategic mining options optimization, and integrated mine planning and waste management
- Characterization of mineralized mine waste as future resource
- Integrated production and waste disposal scheduling
- Strategic mining options optimization: open-pit mining,underground mining or both
- Open-pit/underground mining transition optimization
Risk-based mine planning
- Mine production risk management and integrated optimization
- Stochastic pit limit optimization and pushback design
- Stochastic mine planning optimization methods
- An approach to mine planning with grade, tonnage and metal uncertainty
Computer Labs with GEOVIA WHITTLE Software and OptimalSlope Software
- Case Studies: Oil sands, Gold, Copper and Iron Ore deposits
- Eleven detailed step-by-step hands-on computer application labs
- Additional special lab for determining optimal slope profiles for pitwalls
- Participants will need a laptop for lab exercises
- Software and printed copy of lectures and lab instructions will be provided
- Continuous online lab support beyond course end date
- OptiSim Mining is an educational partner of Dassault Systemes, OptimalSlope and WAIMM
REGISTRATION
Contact Eugene Ben-Awuah at ebenawuah@optisimmining.ca or optisimmining.ca@gmail.com for registration forms and any additional information.
INSTRUCTOR
Eugene Ben-Awuah is an Associate Professor of Mining Engineering at the Bharti School of Engineering, Laurentian University, Sudbury, Canada. He is also the IAMGOLD Research Fellow in Open Pit Mining. He holds a MSc from the University of Mines and Technology and a PhD from the University of Alberta in Mining Engineering. Eugene is a registered professional mining engineer and has extensive operational, consulting and research experience from Ghana, Canada and Australia in mine design and optimization, and mine production management. He teaches and conducts research in strategic mining options optimization, integrated mine planning and waste management optimization, simulation optimization of intelligent and autonomous mining systems, and applications of discrete fracture network. He is the Principal Mining Consultant for OptiSim Mining Solutions on mine optimization and simulation. He is a member of Mining Optimization Laboratory (MOL), the West African Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum (WAIMM) and the Canadian Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum (CIM). He is the Principal Mining Consultant for OptiSim Mining Solutions.
GUEST INSTRUCTOR
Stefano Utili is Professor of Geotechnical Engineering at Newcastle University (UK) and a Chartered Engineer and Fellow of the Institution of Civil Engineering. He is member of the International Technical Committee 208 “Slope stability in engineering practice” and has worked for several years on the stability assessment and design of slopes.
Stefano has developed the initial version of OptimalSlope. He is the CEO of Optimal Slope Software.