Production strategies for coal quality improvement at SLE,Turkey

Abstract

The Seyitömer Lignite Enterprise of the Turkish National Coal Board (SLE) is one of the largest coal producers in Turkey and produces coal from an open cast mine close to the city of Kütahya. The most significant problem that the enterprise currently faces is the low quality run of mine coal which is mainly sold to the nearby power station. The excavation of the partings in the seam together with coal increases the ash content of the coal produced, which in turn decreases the efficiency of the coal burning process at the power station and results in high penalty costs for the mine.

Since the main problems at SLE were caused by the current coal quality, not meeting the standards required by the power plant and the market, and the need for balanced pit development an attempt was made at quality planning to meet the various requirements. Factors related to quality improvement for current and proposed production strategies were determined, according to the customers’ quality demands and the saleable coal quality reserves. Afterwards, the necessity and the degree of selectivity for each strategy and determining of an optimum excavation configuration was defined. The result was high selectivity mining at the B₃ seam to increase the power plant coal quality up to 1761 kcal kg⁻¹ using a production strategy based on maximum coal supply to the market.