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moving the mined ore in any mining company is one part that gives more than a few opportunities for cost savings. Maintaining a dust free haul road is merely one technique by which a mining operation can start to shrink operating costs.

One may think of a haul road as only a filthy road that only serves one purpose, and that is to transport the mined ore from one site to another. But that dusty road is the artery of the total operation. Lacking that dusty haul road a mining company would soon crash. To properly maintain the road is in essence the same as taking care of one’s personal physical condition.

We appreciate what occurs when our arteries stop working properly, but what occurs when a haulage road is no longer maintained correctly.

On a standard haulage road you will have haulage trucks traveling day and night. Several haulage roads have as many as 500 trucks for every day. At the same time others may have fewer trucks but the trucks they do control are many times bigger and heavier. Once more many of the operations are 24 hours each day each day with no time for stopping and re-starting.

While you have nonstop traffic on these haulage roads you must do something to get rid of the dust. Several of these haulage roads are in excess of 5 miles long and typically 50 feet wide. Every one of these roads will require about one gallon per square yard every day to keep the dust abated. If one was to compute these figures you will discover that a typical haul road dust control plan will require millions of gallons of water every week. In a number of locations water is a incredibly treasured commodity that ought to be preserved when feasible not only for the availability but also for the cost of attainment. imagine, what would your water bill be like if you consumed more than a million gallons each and every week?

Since the Haul road is watered to maintain manageable levels of fugitive dust, the road may start to erode. This erosion will set off pot holes and new imperfections which over time may cause the road to become un-drivable. Not only will this turn out to be a dreadfully rough road, but those circumstances will also cause premature failure to the haul trucks.

In addition, the price of maintaining haulage trucks increases dramatically when they have to operate in a dusty location. There are a lot of parts on a truck that stop working faster when they are surrounded by dust. The engine will ingest dust from the haul road which will unavoidably end up in the engine oil, as a result causing a untimely breakdown of the truck and thousands of dollars in repairs.

Maintaining a haulage truck is not a uncomplicated task. You can imagine having to replace a tire that is 10 feet tall. The yearly cost to run these behemoths is greater than most American families receive in five years. If you can reduce that cost you will be saving the company immense amounts of capital that might be directed at something more helpful.

Alleviating these costs is rather uncomplicated. One only needs to employ a efficient road dust control program that not only controls the dust yet will in addition add a high level of erosion control. The more successful programs may in fact convert the old dusty dirt road into a hard stabilized driving surface similar to many asphalt roads. This in turn will eradicate the need for water as a dust control agent and will deliver a very smooth dust free driving surface that will lower the expense of operating the million dollar trucks.

Adding all these savings at once will effortlessly help a mining operation lower their working costs to the point where the dust control program has paid for itself inside a year’s time and the cash from such can then be added to the bottom line.