Collahuasi is one of the world’s highest, harshest job sites.The landscape is so desolate it is sometimes described as “moon like”. Extreme climatic conditions and a low in oxygen environment put thoroughgoing challenges to men and equipment.
Since 1995 ABB delivered and installed the automation system for the open-pit copper mine located in the middle of the Andes, in a historical mining area.The latest project, the automation system based on the Industrial IT System 800xA for a crusher including the delivery conveyor, intermediate bunker and a feeding conveyor to the Collahuasi copper proceeding facility seamlessly integrates with the already installed systems.The project demonstrated the products reliability the high value of customer relationship over time.
Stranded 4,200 to 4,700 meters above sea level in the Andes and surrounded by northern Chile’s brutally barren Tarapacá Desert, the Collahuasi copper mine is subject to conditions that are unprecedented, and unrelenting. Breathing is a struggle in the thin air with barometric pressure of about 0.5 to 0.7 bar.Temperatures rarely top 11 degrees Celsius during the day and normally plunge below freezing at night.
Ferocious blizzards, lightning storms, and active volcanoes batter the region.There are no trees, signs of animal life are rare, and humans are almost unheard of— the nearest settlement is nearly 100 kilometers away.
Challenges
The extreme temperatures and the low in oxygen air put the electrical equipment of the mining machinery to the test every day:
- Extreme high dust formation,
- Vibration, Earth quake,
- Electric storms and extreme thunder storms
- Reduced cooling power
- High range of temperature
- oscillation between day and night from –20 till + 25 °C
Equipment to face the challenges
The operating company of the mine, the Compañia Minera Doña Ines de Collahuasi SCM (CMDIC) ears those conditions in mind when placing the latest extension order for the electrical equipment of a crusher and a belt conveyor system: the company decided on an extremely rugged solution with the reliable Industrial IT Extended Automation System 800xA and ACS 6000 water-cooled medium-voltage frequency converters from ABB. A belt conveyor system to transport the mined material consisting of two rising and one downhill belt, an intermediate bunker and three feeder belts completes this order, which is now successfully commissioned and in operation.The automation system controls and supervises the transport copper ore from a new mine to the existing processing plant.
“The order traces back to the excellent customer relationship over time”, explains Horst Mücklich, head of Business Center Foreign Accounts, Center of Excellence Open Pit Mining Germany. ”Since 1995 ABB has been successfully working with Compañía Minera Doña Inés de Collahuasi”.
The company operates the copper mine in Chile, which is the fourth largest in the world. The first order to monitor and control the mine’s total production on-line Based on an Advant control system. In 2001, ABB received an order comprising drives and ring motors for one SAG mill and two ball mills.
In the same year ABB also won a contract for electrical equipment for a large-scale conveyor
system, consisting of rising and downhill belts and storage facilities, where supplied five 2 MW motors with ACS 6000 drives.
The window to access
System 800xA Operations user interface enable operators to supervise and maintain the process. Several detailed process displays provide a graphical overview, indicating basic information about equipment status and conditions in configurable colors. Operators may take actions through faceplates, which deliver compressed information about drives, sensors and other devices. User rights prevent non-authorized users access to restricted settings like for example changing tuning parameters, thus keeping the system in a solid state. National language support is another key feature, due people of different nationalities and therefore with different mother tongues work in the copper mine.Determining through Microsoft Windows language settings pictures and dialogues are available either in English, German or Spanish language. System 800xA is open to connect to various controllers and control system families like Advant,Melody, Freelance or Harmony using so called Connection Packages. So integration of the existing proven controllers (i.e. AC 450 and AC 110), which were installed in previous steps, become child’s play.
Drives integrated
Redundant controllers of type AC 800M execute the application programs to control the application for the crusher and the conveyor belts. Because of the high power requirement and the altitude of the mine,medium voltage frequency converters of the type ACS 6000 with new low-power modules are first choice. They are interfaced and controlled by controllers of type AC 80. This controller manages access to drive information using fast built-in communication possibilities and fairly eases their integration into the overall control system.
Huge energy savings
Three ACS 6000s power another belt conveying the material down an altitude difference of app. 340 meters.The regenerative drives of this belt, which spans a distance of about 5400 m, return braking energy back to the power network resulting in substantial energy saving because it does not waste the energy as heat. The four-quadrant drive ACS 6000 MultiDrive W provides with direct water-cooling, which makes the converter extremely compact and silent. The enclosing cabinets meet up to protection class IP 54, thus providing the robust design needed for those harsh environmental conditions. Direct water cooling provides for a much smaller design, saving up to 50% of space. It delivers an extremely low audible noise level and avoids excessive ambient temperature variations. Additionally it reduces the need for high-power filtered air-cooling in the installation rooms. Along with the high efficiency, direct water-cooling offers effective and easy heat transfer without air filtering problems.