Seminar: Coupled Hydromechanical Analysis of Tailings Storage Facilities

Join us in November 2021 for a seminar on Coupled Hydromechanical Analysis of Tailing Storage Facilities (TSFs). The free 1-day seminar will take place in Midrand, South Africa, and be conducted by Dr. Reginald Hammah.

• Location: Courtyard Hotel Waterfall City, Karkloof Cres, Waterval City, Midrand, 2066, South Africa
• Seminar Timing: 8 AM - 4 PM South African Standard Time
• Registration Fees: The seminar is free for the attendees. Registration confirmation will be on a first-come-first-serve basis and the number of participants will be capped at 25.

Seminar outline

Overview

Mines build tailings storage facilities (TSFs) to safely store tailings materials both during mining and after operations cease. These facilities are continually under construction up until the end of mining. This means that their stability and performance need to be regularly assessed at initial design and construction, and throughout their existence. Some types of tailings dams can be unforgiving structures. Any combination of improper design, construction and operation of TSFs can result in catastrophic failures. These defects can be due to fundamental errors in understanding the operative strength of loose sands and weak slimes.

Recent catastrophic failures of TSFs in Brazil, Canada and Australia have highlighted their significant impacts on mining companies and communities. These incidents have invited probing of TSFs, and pressure for improved approaches that better assess the stability states of TSFs. They have led to the mistrust of designs and the assessments of TSF performance. Society is simultaneously facing the massive challenge of dealing with hundreds of abandoned or being decommissioned tailings dams and ongoing facilities. Consequently, more TSF work, including design and analysis, is being done.

This one-day seminar will provide an overview of recent finite element advances for modelling TSF stress-deformation behaviours under different loadings and at various stages. It will introduce participants to the basics of FEM stress-deformation modelling of TSFs using the Rocscience 2D and 3D FEM software, RS2 and RS3. The seminar will discuss the simulation of static liquefaction potential using coupled hydromechanical analysis.

The seminar will present the essential geotechnical aspects that need to be considered in undertaking stress-deformation (particularly coupled) analysis of TSFs. It will cover a few examples from various well-known case studies.

Expected Outcomes

The course will help participants to understand the different applications of stress-deformation analysis and be able to do the following:

• Develop the geometry of a simple model and apply appropriate simplifications
• Create an appropriate initial state and construction stages
• Apply material constitutive models and parameters to simulate tailings and soil behaviour
• Undertake coupled stress-deformation analysis, and
• Interpret the outputs of such modelling

Who May Attend

This free seminar is intended for professionals seeking to understand better the stability of tailings dams and who wish to broaden their knowledge of numerical modelling tools for coupled hydromechanical analysis of TSFs.