Design of Highwall Mining at West Bokaro Division of Tata SteelLimited, India

Highwall mining is a new technology, which can extend the life of opencast mines without disturbing thesurface dwellings and maintaining economy and productivity. This technology is in use in United States andAustralia but yet to be introduced in Indian Coalfields. It is a remotely operated coal mining technologyclosely related to underground mining machinery. The method comprises extraction of coal from a series ofparallel entries driven in the coal seam from the face of the highwall. These entries are unmanned, unsupportedand unventilated. A reliable web pillar designing is necessary for ensuring stability and making this methoda success in India. This paper demonstrates the use of decades old empirical pillar design concepts prevalentin India Coalfields coupled with numerical modelling techniques to design Highwall Mining extractions asper the site specific geomining condition