Deposit 3D modeling and application

Abstract

By the aid of the international mining software SURPAC, a geologic database for a multi-metal mine was established, 3D models of the surface, geologic fault, ore body, cavity and the underground openings were built, and the volume of the cavity of the mine based on the cavity 3D model was calculated. In order to compute the reserves, a grade block model was built and each metal element grade was estimated using Ordinary Kriging. Then, the reserve of each metal element and every sublevel of the mine was worked out. Finally, the calculated result of each metal reserve to its actual prospecting reserve was compared, and the results show that they are all almost equal to each other. The absolute errors of Sn, Pb, and Zn reserves are only 1.45%, 1.59% and 1.62%, respectively. Obviously, the built models are reliable and the calculated results of reserves are correct. They can be used to assist the geologic and mining engineers of the mine to do research work of reserves estimation, mining design, plan making and so on.

Keywords

geologic database / deposit model / cavity / reserves / SURPAC software