Review of geomechanical problems of accumulation and reduction of mining industry wastes, and ways of their solution

Purpose. The identification of geomechanical problems of mining industry wastes accumulation and substantiation of the ways for their solution with the possibility of processing the watery technogenic feedstock by fine classification with dewatering. Methods. To achieve this purpose, an integrated approach is used in this work, which includes the scientific and technical analysis of research according to wastes accumulation, state statistics data, analytical studies of the strata compaction ratio of aqueous rocks, affecting the subsidence of the earth surface. This also includes the bench expe-rimental studies to establish the dependence of changes in moisture content and the extraction of fine classes in screened products depending on the screening time at shock-vibrating screening by a new method for separating the enrichment wastes before to stockpile them into a pond. Findings. The developed mathematical apparatus has been proposed for determining the parameters of geomechanical processes in technogenic massifs. It has been shown that in order to reduce the technogenic load and manifestation of negative geomechanical processes, it is necessary to reduce the area of land under the waste ponds and the accumulated volumes themselves of mining and enrichment wastes. The dependences have been established of the preliminary enrichment complex on the qualitative parameters of the feedstock and the technological parameters of the equipment. It has been revealed that the mineral stock, formed from wide grain-size classes with a high content of particles less than 0.2 mm, is dewatered up to 18 – 22% by traditional methods and is practically not classified. Originality. A mathematical model has been proposed of screening and dewatering kinetics, which takes into account comprehensively the initial distribution of particles and liquid throughout the height of the screened material layer, segregation, mixing, sifting, vibrational transportation features (rate, multiplicity and number of falls over the period of vibrational transportation) and change in the height of the layer. This model is different due to the account of the mutual influence of classification by coarseness and dewatering. Practical implications. The represented dependences can be used to predict the development of negative geomechanical processes. The obtained results make it possible by means of a calculation to determine rational parameters of the screen and screening process with dewatering at processing of various feedstock with the use of initial data. The use of technology, which includes a fine classification in wastes processing, will allow: increase the economic efficiency of enterprises; to expand the feedstock base for construction, coke and chemical industries and power industry; to solve the problems of creating additional containers for storing the wastes; to improve significantly the environmental situation in the mining and processing regions.