The influence of deposit uncertainty on mine production scheduling

ABSTRACT

A variety of algorithms are available for short-term mine production scheduling. All assume that the key characteristics of the deposit model are smooth and that a unique representation of the orebody exists. Is the current approach to production scheduling valid if these assumptions are violated? Both a stochastic orebody model based on conditional simulation and an estimated model based on kriging are used as input to a math programming-based scheduler. Deviations in resulting schedules are presented in terms of the impact of geologic uncertainty on production, the efficacy of the traditional approach and suggestions for integrating stochastic models into the production scheduling framework.