Gospodarka Surowcami Mineralnymi - Mineral Resources Management

Emerging technologies represent the direction of the new industrial revolution of promoting sustainable economic and social development, and strategic emerging industries have developed rapidly in China. The development of these emerging technology industries requires more mineral resources as raw materials, especially the need for specific minerals, has increased. The unsatisfied growing demand for minerals used in emerging technologies or an unexpected supply disruption in major producing countries could have an impact on economic development. There are only several studies on the supply of mineral resources from the perspective of mineral resources needed by the development of China’s emerging industries. To assess the criticality of the minerals needed by the strategic emerging industries in China, this paper adopts three indicators: import concentration, the volatility of prices and the application requirements by the Chinese 13th five-year plan dedicated to strategic emerging industries in 2016. Furthermore, 34 types of nonfuel minerals and mineral raw materials are separated into three categories. Finally, this paper indicates that the three indexes are all high for 8 minerals with supply risks, application in emerging technologies, and substantial market fluctuations which need the support of special policies. Two indexes of three Level-II indicators are high for 14 minerals which need different policy combination measures, and one index is high for 12 minerals which also needs attention, all of which were analyzed.

Petřvald is a typical mining town in the Czech part of the Upper Silesian Basin. Since the Petřvald sub-basin is limited by significant tectonic structures, its development was to a great extent independent from other areas of the basin and can serve as an example of the influence of the geological structure on the development of mining and residential communities. In the first phase of mining development (ca 1830 to 1844) first claims begin to occur in the area. Thick coal seams were available in shallow depths. Due to missing railway connection, the demand for coal was not very large and the village economy was focused on agriculture. In the second phase (1844 to 1871), the first underground mines start to operate in the area. They were situated in favorable areas with thin overburden. Also, the connection to the railway improved the sale opportunities and a significant share of the local population worked in the mines. The third phase of mining (1871 to 1963) brought still increasing demand for coal, which resulted in establishing new coal mines in geologically less favorable areas (thicker overburden, water-bearing horizons). From the 1930s to the end of the 1950s the extraction peaked, which coincided with the urbanistic and cultural climax. New housing was provided for miners and their families by the companies. The final stage of mining development (1963 to 1998) is connected with the steady decline of production and phase-out of mining. The reason was a lack of economically recoverable coal reserves connected to unfavorable geological conditions. We conclude that the results of studies concerning specific geological parameters of coal deposits can be used for more detailed analyses regarding the development of urbanism, or to explain its causes.

The mines play an important role in the economic growth of countries since they are suppliers to many industries. In addition to the economic growth, the mines positively affect the social development factors such as the employment creation, the development of rural areas, building new roads, and etc. But sometimes it may lead to the negative environmental, and social impacts. Therefore, the mining activities should be carefully monitored for the concept of sustainable development. In this paper, a fuzzy Best-Worst Method based approach is developed for the evaluation of an iron mine. The case study, Sangan iron ore mine is one of the biggest mines, located in a rural area in the north eastern of Iran. Three factors including the economic, environmental, and social parameters were considered as main sustainable development criteria. The sub-criteria for each mentioned factor were then extracted from the literature as well as knowledge expert’s opinions. In the proposed approach, each sub-criterion was carefully weighted using the fuzzy Best-Worst method and scored by 12 experts. Afterwards, the sustainability score was defined as the summation of final fuzzy scores which was gone under a defuzzification process. The performance evaluation was calculated using this sustainability score resulted to a score of 0.626 out of 1, indicating its acceptable performance. The results showed that the mine performs well in terms of the economic benefits, rate of return, exploration capacity, and stockholders’ rights, but in the environmental management systems, water discharge, recreation and tourism aspects, it does not play well. The results of the implementation of the proposed approach showed the efficiency and effectiveness of the proposed approach that is confirmed by experts.

The mining sector played an important role in the economic growth of the developed countries with rich natural resources in the past, and in recent years, it is important for the economic growth of developing countries. Also, it is generally supported by the incentives due to the fact that mining sector causes other related sectors to grow. Incentives have been the most important economic policy instrument imposed by governments to boost economic growth in developed and developing countries. Incentives or supports given by Turkish state in order to increase the mining investments can be analyzed under two categories; incentives or supports based on the Turkish Mining Law, incentives or supports provided under the Investment Incentive Program. The effect of investment incentives applied to the mining sector in Turkey between the years of 2001 and 2017 on mining production index (MPI) and also the indirect effect of these on gross domestic product (GDP) are investigated by using Granger Causality Test and regression analysis. In this study, the data belonging to the number of investment incentive certificates received by firms operating in Mining Sector and the amount of total fixed investment were used. According to the findings obtained from this study, it has been determined that encouraging the fixed investments of the firms operating in the Mining Sector with incentives has a significant and positive impact on MPI and GDP in a short period of 1 year. H owever, the incentives applied to the mining sector did not increase the production index of the mine in parallel with the increase in the GDP.

Optimization in mine planning could improve the economic benefit for mining companies. The main optimization contents in an underground mine includes stope layout, access layout and production scheduling. It is common to optimize each part sequentially, where optimal results from one phase are treated as the input for the next phase. The production schedule is based on the mining design. Access layout plays an important role in determining the connection relationships between stopes. This paper proposes a shortest-path search algorithm to design a network that automatically connects each stope. Access layout optimization is treated as a network flow problem. Stopes are viewed as nodes, and the roads between the stopes are regarded as edges. Moreover, the decline location influences the ore transport paths and haul distances. Tree diagrams of the ore transportation path are analyzed when each stope location is treated as an alternative decline location. The optimal decline location is chosen by an enumeration method. Then, Integer Programming (IP) is used to optimize the production scheduling process and maximize the Net Present Value (NPV). The extension sequence of access excavation and stope extraction is taken into account in the optimization model to balance access development and stope mining. These optimization models are validated in an application involving a hypothetical gold deposit, and the results demonstrate that the new approach can provide a more realistic solution compared with those of traditional approaches.

The paper presents areas where the EBITDA measure is used in coal companies. The metric and the ratios where it is utilized are employed to assess companies and management efficiency, hence they are used as criteria for rewarding board members. EBITDA-based ratios are also used to evaluate the profitability of company restructuring and its goodwill in mergers and acquisitions. EBITDA, also tends to be used to value companies on the capital market. It is a good tool for efficiency assessment in coal companies with relatively stable fixed assets and small share of intangible assets, which amortized over short periods of time could interfere the comparability of relations based on this measure. The comparability is also disturbed by large investment expenditure incurred in the short term. This does not apply to the mining industry, in which investment cycles are long, last several years and expenditures are spread over time. In addition, the rate of technical progress imposing the need to implement large technology projects is not high compared to technology companies with high development dynamics.

EBITDA based ratios were used to assess a number of listed coal companies. The analysis revealed that the profit/loss of these companies is mainly determined by coal prices. The cost of coal mining is 90% fixed and projects undertaken to reduce it bear fruit only over the long term. Cyclically changing coal prices cause major losses in companies when prices are low, which leads to bankruptcies or a need to restructure. After a period of decline in 2014–2016, the profit/loss of Polish coal companies as well as companies from around the world improved in 2017–2018. T he financial standing of Polish companies was better than that of their counterparts from other parts of the world.

The subject of the research presented in this paper were financial results of mining industry enterprises (PKD 5 – P olish C lassification of A ctivity – “Mining of coal and lignite”) in 2007–2019. The research was conducted using relative and absolute financial measures, forming an extensive and coherent set of features characterizing their financial condition. The purpose was to measure and evaluate the efficiency of examined enterprises operation, considered as an attribute of development as well as factors describing and determining it. This evaluation was made against the background of ongoing restructuring processes taking into account their potential effects.

The article presents the course of the process of adapting P olish hard coal mining to market economy conditions after 1989. The process can be conventionally divided into several periods. The scope and intensity of changes in the mining industry followed the subsequent government programs for mining industry restructuring.

The lignite mining has not implemented any specific restructuring programs. The remedy processes were mainly related to organizational and ownership changes.

In relation to operation efficiency and value creation three turning points in the development path of enterprises were highlighted – 2011, 2015 and 2017, while the period of strong deterioration of results occurred in 2011–2015. I t was proved that restructuring processes did not affect the operating return on sales. However, there was a strong relation between changes in economic conditions on the coal market (prices) and the accumulation rate.

Building a Strategic Battery Value Chain in Europe COM/2019/176 is a priority for EU policy. Europe’s current share of global cell production is only 3%, while Asia has already reached 85%. To ensure a competitive position and independence in the battery market, Europe must act quickly and comprehensively in the field of innovation, research and construction of the infrastructure needed for large-scale battery production. The recycling of used batteries can have a significant role in ensuring EU access to raw materials. In the coming years, a very rapid development of the battery and rechargable battery market is forecast throughout the EU. In the above context, the recycling of used batteries plays an important role not only because of their harmful content and environmental impact, or adverse impact on human health and life, but also the ability to recover many valuable secondary raw materials and combine them in the battery life cycle (Horizon 2010 Work Programme 2018–2020 (European Commission Decision C(2019) 4575 of 2 July 2019)). In Poland, more than 80% of used batteries are disposable batteries, which, together with municipal waste, end up in a landfill and pose a significant threat to the environment. This paper examines scenarios and directions for development of the battery recycling market in Poland based on the analysis of sources of financing, innovations as well as economic and legal changes across the EU and Poland concerning recycling of different types of batteries and rechargable batteries.

Using the Konary anticlinal structure in central Poland as an example, a geological model has been built of the Lower Jurassic reservoir horizon, and CO2 injection was simulated using 50 various locations of the injection well. The carbon dioxide storage dynamic capacity of the structure has been determined for the well locations considered and maps of CO2 storage capacity were drawn, accounting and not accounting for cap rock capillary pressure. Though crucial for preserving the tightness of cap rocks, capillary pressure is not always taken into account in CO2 injection modeling. It is an important factor in shaping the dynamic capacity and safety of carbon dioxide underground storage. When its acceptable value is exceeded, water is expelled from capillary pores of the caprock, making it permeable for gas and thus may resulting in gas leakage. Additional simulations have been performed to determine the influence of a fault adjacent to the structure on the carbon dioxide storage capacity.

The simulation of CO2 injection into the Konary structure has shown that taking capillary pressure at the summit of the structure into account resulted in reducing the dynamic capacity by about 60%. The greatest dynamic capacity of CO2 storage was obtained locating the injection well far away from the structure’s summit. A fault adjacent to the structure did not markedly increase the CO2 storage capacity. A constructed map of CO2 dynamic storage capacity may be a useful tool for the optimal location of injection wells, thus contributing to the better economy of the enterprise.

The article presents the analysis of the correlation between the self-ignition parameters and the ultimate and proximate analysis, as well as the petrographic properties of Polish lignite, sub-bituminous coal, bituminous coal and anthracite. The following coal properties were determined: the moisture, ash content, volatile matter and sulfur content, gross calorific value, net calorific value, C, O, N and H contents, total porosity, ash oxide composition, rates of spontaneous combustion in 237°C and 190°C, and activation energy. During the petrographic analysis, maceral composition and random reflectance were determined. To determine the linear correlation between the self-ignition parameters and the analyzed coal properties, the Pearson correlation coefficient was calculated. The results show that there is no strong linear correlation between the lignite tendency to self-ignition and its petrographic properties. However, a strong negative correlation between the rate of spontaneous combustion and moisture and volatile matter content was observed. In the case of bituminous coal, strong correlations between self-combustion parameters and various coal properties were confirmed. The most noteworthy are the correlations between self-ignition parameters and the maceral composition, that is, between the content of macerals of the inertinite group in coal and content of macerals of the huminite/vitrinite group. The obtained results suggest that the spontaneous combustion tendency of coal increases with the increasing content of semifusinite and liptinite.