Around half-a-century period during which Akmetal managed to become a distinguished chromium producer in the world today has also led the development of the chromium mining in Turkish. Focusing its operations mainly in the locality of Aladag, Adana is committed to contribute to the growth of national mining sector in the future, as in yesterday and today.
Renewing and modernizing its equipment pool completely and increasing its capacity owing to its strong capital structure continuously, Akmetal commenced operations at Adana/Aladag Kumbuku Chromium Processing Plant with a capacity of processing 1.100.000 tons of ore/year, which was built in 2009 using state-of-the art technology and considered one of the model plants in our country.
Reaching a capacity to produce 40.000 tons high-grade (42-52% Cr2O3) blended chromium in recent years with open-pit mining and partially underground method, Akmetal is the biggest concentrate producer in the sector today with a capacity to produce 240.000 tons of concentrate/year that it has reached by producing and processing circa 2 million tons of more blended ore at 4 beneficiation (concentrator) plants enriching low-grade chromium ore.
Akmetal Madencilik Sanayi ve Ticaret A.S. is proud to have ore pits with rich reserves, beneficiation plants equipped with state-of-the art machinery, wide range of heavy equipment and transportation fleet in its possession as well as a staff of technical managers/supervisors who are knowledgeable, talented and experienced.
7 out of 17 operation sites located in Aladag, Adana, which are distributed over a 20.500 hectare land, are operated more densely (Kizilyuksek, Bozluktepe, Sogut, Aktas, Canakpinari, Kocaocak, Abdullahderesi). Other mines have a limited production but the exploration surveys are underway. Production usually involves the method of open-cast mining.
Southern section of Kizilyuksek-Yataardic low-grade chromium deposit, which measures 3200 m in length and is deemed as one of the biggest chromium deposits in Turkey is covered by the license held by Pinar Mining, one of our group companies. Since 2002, over 2 million tons of ore with 7-12% Cr2O3 grade has been produced by way open-pit mining in several parts of this deposit.
Based on the data from the surveys and 30-km exploration conducted between 2007 – 2011 in an attempt to figure out the reserve of the deposit, over 100 million tons of visible and probable reserves with 6.79% Cr2O3 grade of have been determined.
The ore needs of existing concentrate plants of the Group companies and the planned Canakpinari concentrate plant in project designing phase will be largely supplied by this pit.
Meeting some portion of ore need of the existing plants, this pit still continues the mining operations that started back in 2009. The pit which is capable of producing around 800.000 tons of 7-11% Cr2O3 grade chromium ore/year carries on surveys and drilling exploration works.
The pits located in the locality of Kavasak, Canakpinari, Abdullahderesi, Darilik, Bozkonus, Yanikcam, Sogut, Akinekdagi, Mendik, Pizgecmez, Kocaocak and Aktas, Hizar within the borders of Aladag, Adana, which are covered by the licences of Kurmel Group of companies, uses mainly open-cut mining method, whereas the pits in Kavasak ve Akinekdagi uses closed-pit mining to produce chromium ore. Of these pits, Sogut, Yanikcam, and Akinekdagi pits carries out nugget ore (42-54% Cr2O3) production.
Our exploration works are underway in such locations across our mines as deemed appropriate. Within this scope, it is ensured that our mineral resources formed in millions of years are explored and processed effectively and then exploration and processing reports are prepared in accordance with scientific and technical principles and international standards.
According to the data from geological surveys conducted so far under the supervision of geological engineers and drilling wells measuring 110.000 m in total, which were bored using 10 drilling machines that we have, one of which is underground equipment, more than 125 million tons of visible + probable reserves were detected. Necessary machinery and equipment investment has been completed, so the exploration works will continue.
Horzum zinc deposit located in Kozan, Adana has been mined since early 1970s. Previously, approximately 12–15 thousand tons of high grade (>35% Zn) carbonaceous ore was produced annually and sold once calcined. In later years, low grade (30-35% Zn) carbonated ore was produced and sold.
When the pit got deepened and revealed sulphide ore, a flotation plant was built in 1985, at which 35.000 tons of sulphide ore were produced annually until the end of 1997.
Etekli zinc-lead mine is located in the Village of Etekli around 30 km southwest of Aladag. 160-m long gallery was dug down and some sort of mineralization in the form of limonite, hematite, calcite and aragonite lodes were found in the deposit of limestones.
In the light of surface and underground geological mapping surveys carried out after 2006, tunnelling and drilling exploration works will kick off in 2012 and Horzum and Etekli Zinc mines will be put back into operation.
The Company owns a licence for a barite mining site in the village of Tortulu in the town of Feke, Adana. The license site is 15 km from Feke and 70 km from Kozan.
Our coal license site is located in the locality of the Village of Danadere, in the town of Saimbeyli, Adana. The lower thermal value of the samples was found to be 3100 kcal/kg.
Built over a total of 34.000m2 land, 21.000m2 of which is indoor and 13.000m2 is outdoor; Kumbuku Beneficiation Plants have a capacity of 7.000 tons/day. An average of 6-9% grade, blended ore is fed and 46–48% grade concentrate is produced.
The Plants consist of a chain of crushers, grinders, sorters (hydrosizers/wet screens), shakers, spirals, sand drums and thickeners..
There are seven main mills which are all rod mills operating in open circuit. Also, there are five intermediate grinders which are ball mills operating in closed circuits. The grinders are fitted with two sludge/mud pumps in the front, one of which is for redundancy. Once ground by main mills, the ore are fed to the screens, then sent through the hydrosizers owing to the difference in elevation under the screen while the oversize intermediate product is fed to intermediate product mills.
The process involves eighteen hydrosizers. Once the ore from the screens is sorted by size in the hydrosizers, ten of which have eight cells and four of which have six cells, it is fed to the triple-deck and double-deck tables., while four hydrosizers run in tailing beneficiation process.
Intermediate product from the spirals is fed to triple-deck shaking tables, and the concentrate obtained is sent to concentrate pool while the tailings are sent through the tailing channel to double-deck shaking tables for beneficiation process.
There are 4 sand drums into which all tailings of the process are fed. In the sand drums, coarse grains are removed from the tailings and sent away by way of a belt conveyor. Fine grains, though, are fed to hydrosizers in tailing beneficiation unit for repeated enrichment process.
The site allocated as a tailing dam has an area of 100.000 m2 and a volume of 6 million m3. A gradual replacement of the tailing dam by a series of “filter presses” is planned to be completed by 2016.
The water derived from the tailing dam is pumped into the clean water pond and used as recycled water. When necessary, additional water is pumped from the creek nearby.
In this process, there are additional hydrosizers, spirals and shakers. Fine tailing in the sand drums is not sent to the thickener but instead fed to the precipitation cone and then to hydrosizers. Following the classification by size in the hydrosizers, the material is fed to the double deck processing tables. The concentrate is sent to concentrate pool while the tailings and intermediate products head to thickener.
There are four crusher units. Two of them consist of two jaw crushers, two double-deck screens, two conic crushers. The other two involves two jaw crushers, two double-deck screens, four conic crushers. Conic crushers operate closed circuit. Screen undersize is stored in two fine ore bunkers with a total capacity of 7.000 tons.
There are eleven quadruple-deck wet screens. Seven of these screens operate in open circuit with the main mills while four of them operate in closed circuit with the intermediate product mills. Screen undersize is fed to hydrosizers and the screen oversize is fed to intermediate product mills for regrinding.
The process includes 4-pitch 122 spirals with 3 feeding cells. Intermediate and tailings coming from tables are fed to the most of the spirals while 1/3 portion thereof is used for feeding the classified ore from the hydrosizers, where they are subjected to pre-beneficiation process and concentrate, intermediate product and tailings are derived.
The process includes 270 double-deck shaking tables. 40 of these tables run in tailing enrichment unit; into which the intermediate from triple-deck tables and also double-deck shaking tables is fed for re-beneficiation process. The tailings are transferred from these tables to the tailing pond; the concentrate heads off to the concentrate pond while the intermediate product is sent to the screens operating in closed circuit, due to relative grain content, for size reduction process.
The process includes three thickeners. In the thinners, the fine tailings coming from the tailing enrichment unit goes through flocculation process and precipitated, after which it is sent to the tailing dam. Once stabilized in the thickeners, the water is transferred to the clean water pool.
There are four product buckets fitted to feed the intermediate back to the system. Intermediate obtained from last table unit is collected in these buckets and fed to screens by means of sludge pumps. Screen undersize <0,8 mm is fed to the system, while the screen oversize is fed back to the intermediate mills operating in closed circuit.