Rationale for open-pit mining of non-industrial bauxite deposits in the Northern Urals

Abstract

At the moment, the extraction of bauxite in Russia is carried out by four enterprises: OJSC SUBR (3,136.4 thousand tons), OJSC UUBR (186 thousand tons), OJSC Boksitogorsk Alumina (200 thousand tons), and OJSC Severo-Onezhsky Bauxite Mine (303.8 thousand tons). Ural aluminium smelters are supplied with 80-90% of their raw materials from the Severouralskoye deposit. The Kandalaksha, Krasnoyarsk, and partially Irkutsk and Novokuznetsk aluminum smelters depend on the state of the raw material base of SUBR. The main type of bauxite extraction at SUBR is underground mining (about 95% of bauxite extracted). The remaining 5% is extracted by open pit mining. The volumes of open-pit bauxite mined are quite insignificant compared to the bauxite mined from the mines. There are a number of reasons why open-pit mining is becoming increasingly important at SUBR. At SUBR, all of the surrounding areas are being actively explored for possible open pit mining of small bauxite deposits. However, insignificant bauxite deposits are excluded from the range of deposits potentially suitable for development due to the fact that the evaluation of the bauxite-bearing areas is carried out without taking into account the complexity of deposits, the characteristic feature of which in this region is the joint occurrence of coal and bauxite on a limestone basement. Moreover, there are a number of coal mines, due to the industry focus of which under the mined coal seams remain untouched deposits of bauxite.