Spotlight Feature Articles AUGUST 17 SPOTLIGHT | Page 2

OPERATION FOCUS
Pride of Belarus
Paul Moore visited one of the
world’s giants of potash mining,
Belaruskali, in the city of Soligorsk,
Belarus, to see how it has embraced
new technology to maintain record
production levels
he Starobin potash salt deposit is the raw
material base of JSC Belaruskali. It began
to form about 350-360 million years ago,
and today it is considered to be one of the
world’s largest deposits. It covers an area of
about 350 km 2 and is located in the southern
part of the Minsk Region of the Republic of
Belarus centred on the city of Soligorsk which
has developed in tandem with the mine. The
commercial reserves are more than 3 billion
tonnes of raw potash.
Structurally it presents a flat sheet deposit
(angle of slope is 1-30°), consisting of four
potash levels from the 1st to 4th (from top
downward). The distance between potash levels
is 50-60 m (between 1st and 2nd levels) to 150-
200 m (between the 2nd and 3rd levels and
between the 3rd and 4th levels).
In recent years the company has built two
new mines, thus having settled for the
foreseeable future the issue of maintaining
mineral resources. One of the new mines –
Krasnoslobodsky mine – will ensure the
operation of Production Unit 3 for more than 40
years. Berezovsky mine was commissioned in
2012 and its reserves were estimated at 247.5
Mt.
During the construction of the new mines the
company implemented the latest technologies
in the field of mine development. This includes
T
International Mining | AUGUST 2017
the latest ground freezing technology. This work
has been contracted to Belarus-based Delta
Drilling Company which in addition to the main
Belaruskali Soligorsk site conducted freeze
drilling at the Garlyk and Petrikov mines. Delta
has used three drills – Drillmec G-25 (Italy);
Drillmec G-33 Astra (Italy) and Drillmec G-33
Iveco (Italy) for the work.
Ground freezing is used around the world for
shaft sinking (and in some cases in specialised
mining techniques such as in Canadian uranium
mining) and is an artificial ground freezing
technique used to construct substructures in
soft, unstable water-bearing soils; in the potash
The Belaruskali mining
field showing current
Production Units and
future areas to be mined
Belaruskali operates four potash
Production Units, developed since
operations began in 1958
case for shaft development. The essence of this
technique lies in drilling a system of boreholes
with freezing pipes every 0.8-2m prior to
starting operations along the substructure
contour. Coolant (brine) liquid cooled to
subfreezing temperatures (up to -40°C) is
passed through freezing pipes using pumps.
Due to constant circulation of coolant in freezing
pipes, the water in water-saturated ground
freezes and ice wall cylinders are formed around
each pipe, which are later joined into a solid ice
wall. Frozen grounds abruptly change their
physical and mechanical properties (strength,
adhesion etc), which allows for starting mining