«Gormashexport» Ltd. (Russia):

Bauman A. V., Ph. D. in Engineering Siences, Deputy Director on Science, aleksei_bauman@mail.ru

The statistical review of process audit results on more than a hundred upgraded and newly constructed concentrating plants showed, that at two-out-of-three plants commissioning problems were related to errors in design and arrangement of thickening circuits and return water systems. However, optimal organization of these processes affects not only the plant capacity and quality of product, but also its total operational capability. The paper considers main examples of such errors, presents an analysis of the reasons for occurrence of errors and proposes ways for risk minimization in process and design concepts at design stage. The reasons for the errors are divided into two categories — organizational and processing. The organizational reasons include, among others, personnel problem and lack of generally accepted normative documents in integrated design of thickening circuits and return water systems. It is shown, that main reasons for processing errors are: discrepancy between actual and design characteristics of feed, low quality of preliminary studies at the stage of sedimentation processes modeling, design errors, wrong choice of equipment for thickening circuits and return water systems. A more thorough attention is given to specialties of process examination in design of clay-containing slurries thickening circuits, as well as to issues of preliminary estimate of radial and thin-layer thickeners performability in designed circuits.

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