1638 Figure 5 – Hybrid flowsheet incorporating ILR and IMR with conventional mining and processing 3.2 Results and Discussion The application of the workflow to this orebody resulted in a predicted mine life of over 60 years. The optimisation routine was not used to smooth the production rate to the extent that would be done during later project stages. Figure 6 shows the simulated mine production and stope selection by mining method for the uppermost and lowest mining levels as an example of the sequencing output for one life-of-mine plan featuring a hybrid CM/ILM mining process and IMR recovery from backfilled stopes such as shown in Figure 5. Figure 6 – Simulated mine production by mining method for the CM+ILR+IMR scenario at two levels. The results indicated that ILR was preferentially suited to the upper zone of the deposit, where higher grade material and more favourable access conditions supported underground upgrading. This suggested that ILR was not applied uniformly across the orebody, but was chosen where the combination of grade, access, material characteristics and processing constraints made early upgrading economically attractive.
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