ABB’s gearless mill drive system improves energy efficiency and provides increased process availability at Teck’s Carmen de Andacollo copper mine.
Baden, Switzerland, May 12, 2010 – ABB, the leading power and automation technology group, announces that it has successfully completed the commissioning of a 13.4 MW gearless mill drive (GMD) system for the Hipogeno project. The GMD powers a 36 feet SAG (semiautogenous) mill at Carmen de Andacollo mine in central Chile.
Carmen de Andacollo is an open-pit truck-and-shovel operation at an elevation of 1,000 meters, adjacent to the town of Andacollo, approximately 55 kilometres southeast of La Serena and 350 kilometres north of Santiago. 90% of the interests of the mine are held by Teck, Canada’s largest diversified mining, mineral processing and metallurgical company, headquartered in Vancouver, Canada. The remaining 10% are held by Empresa Nacional de Minería, a Chilean government entity.
ABB’s deliveries comprised an entire GMD system including transformers, ring motors and a complete E-house. With a GMD acting as a variable speed drive, mills start smoothly without any mechanical stress. GMDs provide maximum control over the grinding process and allow for adjustments, meeting customer requirements for process efficiency and flexibility. ABB gearless mill drive systems provide improved energy efficiency, superior reliability, increased process availability, and an extended life span for all equipment. They allow bi-directional operation, have integrated frozen charge protection and offer positioning and creeping without an auxiliary drive. The mine’s expanded production capacity will be 80,000 tons of fine copper per year.
ABB and Teck have had a long and successful collaboration over the years. Marcelo Cifuentes, head of electrical maintenance at Teck, states: “ABB’s solution has helped us to successfully transition from a solvent extraction and electro-winning (SX-EW) plant that has an annual production of about 20,000 tons of fine copper type "A" to a concentrator plant that will produce around 80,000 tons of fine copper per year. The transfer to this new technology, incorporating the same workers in SX-EW, has been a milestone for us and for the community, since much of the workforce in Carmen de Andacollo comes precisely from Andacollo Town.”
ABB (www.abb.com) is a leader in power and automation technologies that enable utility and industry customers to improve performance while lowering environmental impact. The ABB Group of companies operates in around 100 countries and employs about 117,000 people.