Numerical Analysisof Top Coal Recovery Ratioby using Discrete ElementMethod

Abstract

There is a massive quantity of lignitecoal reserves at the Thar CoalfieldPakistan which are demarcated through thick coal seams. To extract these thick coal seams, the chosen method for mining is Top Coal Caving. The Longwall Top Coal Caving (LTCC) has been one of the preferred underground mining methodsthat has been developedand then accepted by its guaranteed results in China’s coal mining industry. Thispaper discusses numerical modeling of top coal caving mining method and studies the coal recovery ratio by using discrete element method. In the modelingconsequences, the total top coal recovery ratio was computed to be 83.9% when the top coalthickness was three times the cutting height with the drawing interval of 0.8m respectively. Based on thisstudy,itis proposed that LTCCmethod canbe adopted for the mining of thickcoal seam(s) atThar Coalfield.