New Techniques and Technologies in Mining

Mining is the foremost source of minerals that all countries find essential for maintaining and improving their standards of living. Mined materials are needed to construct roads and hospitals, to build automobiles and houses, to make computers and satellites, to generate electricity, and to provide many other goods and services that consumers enjoy. The high tech industries and even the better known resource industries are all dependent, in some way, on the mining industry. But exploring, extraction and processing of minerals require big material and labour costs and there is a big number of acute problems to face, such as: environment and water pollution, worsening of mining-geological conditions, depletion of minerals that can be extracted only by conventional methods, rock pressure manifestation, big depths of the deposits and transportation of the minerals on the surface. In order to find modern solutions there is a big number of scientists and engineers all over the world dedicating their research to most current problems and inventions of innovative technologies and techniques in mining. Some of the most important results of such research is presented in this book and covers the following topics: management of strain and stress state of the massif, underground coal gasification, substantiation of rational parameters of various types of support, ventilation in underground openings, design of mine workings and other vital questions.