Phoenix Mill Expansion

Newmont Mining Corporation | United States | 2011–2012

33,700 to 48,000 tpd

increase in throughput

2x

rougher flotation retention time

Increased

capacity in the existing grinding cyclones

Increased

capacity in the existing deslime cyclones

Challenges

  • The mill struggled with ore variability and hardness, producing a copper concentrate with gold and silver credits that decreased throughput, and ultimately reduced metal and concentrate production.
  • One of the main challenges of this brownfield operation was installing the circuits within existing process infrastructures without disturbing ongoing operations.
  • Integrating the new circuits required a lot of planning to ensure the scheduled shutdown and process commissioning was kept to a minimum.

Solutions

  • Provided detailed engineering, procurement assistance, and field support for the project.
  • A two-phased expansion of the mill facilitated the increased throughput.
  • Phase 1 added a new secondary crushing and screening circuit to decrease feed particle size to the SAG mill.
  • Phase 2 expanded the grinding, rougher flotation, and tailings deslime areas, increasing capacity in the existing grinding cyclones and the deslime cyclones, and doubling the rougher flotation retention time.

Highlights

  • Increased overall mill throughput from 33,700 to 48,000 tons per day
  • Increased capacity in the existing grinding cyclones
  • Doubled the rougher flotation retention time and increased the capacity in the existing deslime cyclones

Project numbers

US$8.5 million
33,700 to 48,000 tpdincrease in overall mill throughput

Services & technologies provided

Copper

Engineering

Procurement


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