Helpful information. Methods for extracting limestone stone Classification of limestone and its description

Limestone is quite a valuable natural resource. The scope of use of limestone materials is quite wide. Of course, it is worth considering that, like all natural resources, it can be exhausted.

There are a lot of limestone deposits around the world, this rock is not rare, but depending on the methods of extraction and the technique used, it can be quite different in its structure.

As for Russia, the number of quarries for the extraction of limestone is quite a lot, they are available in almost every corner. The following regions are sufficiently known and made public: Voronezh, Leningrad, Tula, Arkhangelsk, Belgorod, Vologda.

Of course, one should not forget about the deposits located in Krasnodar Territory, in the Urals, in the Moscow region, as well as in some regions of Siberia.

In the Vologda region, a limestone deposit is under development, and the resources that are mined there are used for a lime plant located nearby.

The Slobodskoye field is less well-known, as it is located on the territory of a closed railway station.

The Novo-Pristanskoye field is located on the territory of the municipal Satka district. AT this moment limestone reserves are more than 8 thousand tons.

The most popular among enterprises that use limestone as the main raw material in their production are the Savinskoye and Shvakinskoye deposits. It is located in the Arkhangelsk region and includes the Shestovsky, Ogarkovsky and Levoberezhny sections.

The resources that are mined here are used in cement production. According to the balance sheet, limestone reserves are about 106,000 thousand tons. Of this volume, about 65,020 thousand tons are in the undistributed fund. The rest is in the process of preparation, development and technical preparation of the limestone mining project.

The Shvakinskoye field is located in the Arkhangelsk region, namely in the urban settlement of Obozer. This site consists of two territories - Left Bank and East. The left bank section is considered a reserve fund, i.e. no activities regarding the development of methods for the extraction of limestone are carried out here.

The eastern part is used quite intensively, and today the volume of production per year is 100 thousand tons per year. The limestone mined from this quarry is used for the cement industry.

Thus, we can say that Russia is a fairly rich country in terms of resource reserves.

Sedimentary rock of organic, less often chemogenic origin, consisting mainly of calcium carbonate in the form of calcite crystals of various sizes.

Limestone, consisting mainly of the shells of marine animals and their fragments, is called shell rock. In addition, there are nummulite, bryozoan and marble-like limestones - massively layered and thinly layered. During metamorphism, limestone recrystallizes and forms marble.

Calcium carbonate, which is part of limestone, is able to slowly dissolve in water, and also decompose into carbon dioxide and the corresponding bases. First process - the most important factor the formation of karst, the second, occurring at great depths under the influence of the deep heat of the Earth, provides a source of gas for mineral waters.

Application area

limestone brick

The most widely used limestone is construction material. The strength of many varieties of limestone is sufficient for the construction of multi-storey buildings. Thin layers of wear-resistant stone - limestone flagstone - are a finished material, such limestone is used to line buildings and pave paths.

Layered limestone with a pronounced weathering relief is valued by decorators, designers and landscape architects.

Manufacturers of natural stone products often successfully play with the biological origin of the rock. The shells of ancient mollusks, preserved in limestone deposits, become an important expressive element of finishing materials. Indispensable for any construction and cements - which, in turn, are made from a mixture of limestone and clay verified in percentage terms.

Limestone marl

Marl - this is the name of the variety, which includes the right amount of aluminosilicates. It is mined in many regions of the world.

How limestone is mined

Limestone can be mined using an explosive method. To do this, you first need to open the deposits by removing the earth from them with the help of bulldozers. It is also necessary to remove clay and substandard limestone from them. Along the edge of the mining site, it is necessary to drill wells and put explosives there. If the explosions are properly organized, they will break off large layers of limestone, which later need to be loaded into dump trucks and taken to the processing site.

To understand what limestone is, you need to know about its origin and places of occurrence. Looking ahead, let's say that this rock is in great demand in construction as a natural stone, as well as a binder in the manufacture of lime and cement.

Limestone is also used in the food and chemical industries and as a flux (impurity) in metallurgy. Such massive use and popularity of the material explains its mining on a huge scale in many parts of the world.

How is limestone formed?

Living marine organisms, large and small, are very important in the origin of limestone. Developing in huge numbers in the depths of the sea, these marine inhabitants multiply incredibly quickly, but also die quickly.

Microorganisms manage to extract enough lime from the water during their existence to equip their bodies with reliable protection in the form of shells or various shells. Subsequently, the skeletons of dead microorganisms lie on the seabed in whole layers.

Over time, these layers are pressed by the water mass, become strong and eventually turn into stone, the main component of which is calcite. As a result, the amount of calcium carbonate is 60% of the total mass of limestone. The rest is carbon dioxide and minor clay impurities. It is the impurities that color limestone in different colors.

Limestone types

Natural stone is characterized by the following parameters:

• origin;
• structure;
• chemical composition;
• structure.

Video: Limestone-shell rock

Origin of the stone

• Organogenic. Formed from various remains of organic origin, which include: sludge and reef limestone, as well as shell rock.
• Chemogenic. Occur in the process of calcium precipitation.
• Clastic. They are the result of the destructive activity of the oldest limestones.

limestone structure

Chemical composition

• Dolomitized. The composition of these limestones includes up to 17% magnesium. With an increase in this figure, dolomitic limestones pass into the dolomite group, having previously passed through a number of intermediate processes.
• Marbled limestones are transitional variants of formations, resulting in the transformation into marble.
• Mergeli. Stones, which include up to 50% clay particles.

Structure

• Limestones differ among themselves in the degree of granularity:
• Oolitic. They have a granular structure. The oolite grains are tightly bound together. The grain size does not exceed 1 mm. Oolites have the ability to dissolve. Then voids form in their place.
• Pozolitic. The structure of these limestones consists of larger grains, the size of which exceeds 1 mm.

natural stone color

The standard color of the breed is white, gray, yellowish. The impurities that make up the stone can give it different shades: clay particles - brown tones, algae - greenish, iron and manganese - reddish reflections. The presence of impurities in limestone gives beautiful results.

Where and how is limestone mined?

Limestones have the ability to originate in any water bodies: marine, freshwater. But the bulk of this breed is still of marine origin.

In addition to Australia, rock deposits are found on almost all continents. Large reserves of limestone are found in America. The central part of the territory of Russia is rich in stone deposits. Its production is successfully carried out in the following regions of the Russian Federation: in the Moscow region, as well as in the Voronezh, Arkhangelsk and Tula regions.

In the Krasnodar Territory, in the Leningrad Region, Belgorod and Vologda regions limestone quarries are also organized. Deposits of rock in the Urals and Siberia can be called piece. The Alps, whose mountain ranges are mostly made of limestone, are proof that the mountain range was once an integral part of the seabed.

Video: How limestone slabs are made for finishing

The extraction of this rock is carried out by the method open development. First, the upper substandard layers of limestone, clay and earth are removed. Then, explosives are laid around the entire perimeter of the extraction. Directional explosions break the rock into huge pieces, which in turn are loaded by excavators onto dump trucks and delivered to the processing site.

Where is limestone used?

The breed is distinguished by a variety of applications in various fields:

The material is used in different forms:

• in the form of rubble;
• rubble stone, piece or lump;
• mineral powder or crumbs;
• sand;
• facing plates;
• limestone flour;
• mineral wool.

In hydraulic structures, porous limestone is used as a filter for water. This breed is very in demand in the arrangement of the foundations of buildings. The constituents of ordinary limestone are lime and concrete.

Crushed stone is part of the road surface of routes that are not subjected to frequent loads. Limestone is used for the production of soda, and is also the basis of numerous mineral fertilizers.

Limestone is well split, cut and sawn, processed in any direction. The high thermal insulation properties of the rock and its durability make it possible to create a wide variety of high-quality building materials.

Limestone tiles

This facing material is used for finishing various surfaces. Exterior cladding of the building with limestone tiles ennobles appearance building and provide it with a long service life. In a country house there are other places where you can apply facing tiles: stairs, pools, landscape design elements.

Limestone tiles are also actively used for finishing the interior surfaces of buildings: walls, floors, window sills. Beautiful, well-matched colors of natural material allow you to create truly unique designs of bar counters, kitchen worktops, arches, fireplaces.

Effects of climatic conditions on the properties of limestone

The rock is valued as a building material for its low density, compliance with sawing and cutting tools, excellent adhesive properties and a variety of external advantages.

Humid climatic conditions significantly reduce the strength of limestone. Moreover, the stone is distinguished by the heterogeneity of the rock, therefore, the density here is different. This important point needs special attention.

The strength of the material and the duration of its operation is affected by its frost resistance. This parameter is much higher for crystalline limestones, but in the absence of pores and cracks in the material.

In order to prevent the destruction of natural material during its application, it is necessary to take into account the above-mentioned properties of limestone.

This is how you live and do not notice what is happening under your nose))) Ten kilometers from the house is the Sokolsko-Sitovsky quarry, from which on Thursdays (and sometimes on Tuesdays) an explosion is sure to spread - limestone layers are torn. In the early 1990s, I even worked there as an assistant excavator operator. Moreover, he also unlearned as an excavator operator, but did not begin to work ...

I, of course, know how limestone is mined. But, I did not know that it could look so beautiful and romantic)))

Original taken from chistoprudov How is limestone mined.

A detailed production report from the Sokolsko-Sitovskoye flux limestone quarry, located a couple of kilometers northeast of Lipetsk. Under the cut are large excavators, BelAZ trucks, a factory, conveyors, an explosion and much more...

1. Some official data: The quarry is being developed by Studenovskaya Joint-Stock Mining Company, currently a member of the NLMK Group and one of the Russian leaders in the production of flux limestone, used mainly in the metallurgical industry and construction.

2. Mining volumes account for more than 15% of the mined flux limestone in Russia.

3. The dimensions of the quarry are impressive: 1500x500 meters, and the depth is 50 meters. Here you can easily build more than 10 football fields or lay a track for Formula 1...

4. According to geologists, the reserves of raw materials in the quarry at the current capacity will be enough for at least 30 years of operation.

5. Limestone is a widespread sedimentary rock formed with the participation of living organisms in marine basins. Once upon a time, approximately 350-370 million years ago, in the Devonian period of the Paleozoic era, the Lipetsk region, like many regions of the central part of Russia, was a sea. Often in the fragments of the rock you can find fossil remains of the ancient life of those years ...

6. The deposit is developed by an open method. The technological process of mining can be divided into the following main types of work:
Stripping works
mining operations
Dumping and mining reclamation
Transport work
Mineral processing

7. Overburden works.
First, with the help of a bulldozer or loader, they remove the top fertile layer of soil - black soil, and store it for subsequent reclamation of lands disturbed by mining. This is followed by a clay layer with a thickness of about 20 meters, which is worked out by electric excavators with a bucket capacity of 8 - 10 cubic meters. Overburden works also include partial sampling of substandard (poor quality) limestone, which is located directly under the clay layer.

8. This photo clearly shows a section of the “quarry pie”: a layer of clay, a layer of substandard limestone and an even ledge of a mineral. The crumbling hill of limestone under the ledge is a consequence of the explosion. It is precisely these “consequences of the cry” that are loaded into BelAZ trucks and taken to the factory. And all overburden rocks are taken to the internal dump.

9. Mining work.
It is customary for miners to say production, with an emphasis on the first syllable. The actual extraction of limestone is preceded by drilling and blasting - the most spectacular part of the whole process.

10. A hard layer of limestone, which cannot be scooped up with an excavator bucket, has to be drilled, explosive materials are placed in it and blown up. For drilling, drilling rigs of the SBR type, powered by electricity, are used.

11. Drilling rigs are serious, they drill holes with a diameter of 16 cm to a depth of up to 24 meters (7 floors). It takes 50 minutes to drill one well. A string of wells, elongated in a line, is drilled one by one 5 meters from the edge of the cliff.

12. Brave driller!

13. For the explosion, industrial and conversion explosives are used, the acquisition of which requires a whole bunch of various permits and licenses, as well as special vehicles for transportation and armed guards. You can't just buy gunpowder at the market ...

14. TNT checkers serve as a detonator.

15. On average, about 30 wells are drilled to carry out one explosion, where a total of 5-6 tons of explosives are laid.

16. To connect all the wells with explosives into a single circuit, a detonating cord is used.

17. An explosion is a very responsible matter! The quarry is completely cordoned off, guards are posted in the area of ​​​​the future explosion. All equipment is taken to a safe distance, and BelAZ vehicles generally leave the quarry. Before the explosion, all cordon posts are polled by radio and the situation is clarified. If everything is fine, permission is given to carry out blasting. (The security post and the transformer box are also being taken away).

18. The wells are not blown up simultaneously, but with a delay of several hundredths of a second, otherwise there will be an earthquake, and most of the buildings in Lipetsk will have windows blown out.

19. For a sense of scale - on the right side of the frame there is an excavator the size of a 4-story building ... Small pieces of rock can fly away to a distance comparable to the height of the main building of Moscow State University - 250 meters.

20. It can be seen how heavy pieces of hard rock are separated from the ledge in even rows and fall down.

21. The whole explosion passes in a few seconds and is well heard in the city. This is what collapsed rock looks like. After the smoke clears and the dust settles, the explosives will check for failed charges, after which the excavators and BelAZ trucks will go about their work.

22. The rock is loaded into BelAZ using a mechanical shovel (that is, an excavator), or rather, using a self-propelled full-turn excavation and loading machine. This monster runs on 6000 volt electricity, the photo shows a high-voltage cable that powers the excavator's engines. During a day of operation, the machine consumes as much energy as an ordinary nine-story residential building in a week.

23. At one time, the excavator can load 10 ordinary photographers, or 20 Chinese photographers.

24.

25. The weight of such a bucket is 16 tons.

26. Each excavator employs two people to ensure the continuity of the production process.

27. In total, 6 large excavators (bucket with a volume of 8 and 10 cubic meters) and 2 smaller ones with a bucket volume of about 5 cubic meters work in the quarry.

28. Sometimes appliances break down. For example, the main gear of this excavator has failed and it is being repaired right in the quarry. The diameter of the limply hanging steel ropes is 4 cm.

29. And this is a now decommissioned veteran who honestly gave the enterprise about 40 years. In spite of respectable age and shabby appearance, grandfather, in case of emergency, can be brought to work in the quarry.

30. Dumping and mining reclamation.
At a constant depth, the quarry bowl constantly moves in the direction along which the limestone occurs. On one side of the quarry, overburden is removed and limestone is mined, on the other, the goaf is filled with overburden, limestone crushing screenings and black soil.

31.

32. Screenings are brought from the crushing and processing plant in dump cars, which are formed after limestone crushing and are not suitable for use. The excavator dumps everything on the dump, filling the mined-out space of the quarry. Then the dumps will be covered with previously opened soil and top with black soil.

33. This smaller mechanical shovel has a 5 cube bucket.

34. Further plowing of the lands is carried out and biological reclamation is carried out - the sowing of lands with useful plants. In a few years, the recultivated lands can be used again for agricultural purposes. Previously, the quarry started right from the landings (on the right in the frame) and has shifted 600 meters in 20 years. Now there is a field. In the future, the quarry may advance another 2.7 kilometers.

35. Transport work.
Every day, 12 BelAZ trucks operate on the line in the quarry, which ensure the transportation of overburden rock to dumps, and the mined limestone to the DOF - to the crushing and processing plant.

36. Belazists work around the clock in three shifts, eight hours each. During the day, BelAZ makes up to 100 walkers, and transports up to 16 thousand tons of mined limestone. In three months, the car runs the distance from Moscow to Vladivostok.

37. The carrying capacity of such a BelAZ is 55 tons, more than its own weight. BelAZ trucks with a higher carrying capacity in this quarry are not advisable to use for several reasons: the depth of the quarry, the distance of transportation, the volume of production, and so on. This baby mammoth is powered by a 700 hp diesel engine.

38. If during transportation from BelAZ something falls out onto the road, such as a large stone, a special wheeled bulldozer will remove it back to the face, to the excavator.

39. They actively fight dust in the quarry, the roads are constantly doused with a special watering can. And in winter, watering is replaced by sprinkling with a sand-salt mixture.

40. To take this shot, I had to ask the driver on the radio (each piece of equipment in the quarry is equipped with a radio station) to drive outside the watered road. The permissible speed in the quarry is 20 km/h.

41. The quarry has 14 km of technological roads built in bulk, there are also electrification and substations to power excavators. The roads are excellent, you can easily move on them by car.

42. Shop for the repair and maintenance of BelAZ.

43.

44. The body and engine were removed from this BelAZ.

45. The mined mineral is brought to the DOP and unloaded into the receiving bunker, before that the dump truck is weighed and by simply subtracting the weight of the empty BelAZ, the weight of the cargo is obtained.

46. ​​Receiving hopper.

47. Mineral processing.
This is the first building of the factory - the coarse crushing building. Here, the jaw crusher rough crushes large pieces of rock. Fractions up to 10 cm in size are obtained.

49. Approximately 15,000 tons of rock are transported on a conveyor belt per day.

50. Cone crusher performs medium crushing.

51. Cunning system of vibrating screens. In closed devices, the products are divided into fractions (according to the size of the stones) and distributed along the conveyors.

52. An ordinary five-story house can easily fit in the workshop ...

53. Very fine limestone - screenings up to 1 cm are sent for unloading into dump cars for subsequent transportation to the quarry dump.

54. Corps of sorting and loading. Comes here finished product, where loading into railway wagons takes place. The main consumer of the products is the Novolipetsk Iron and Steel Works.

55.

56. One car includes 69 tons of crushed stone.

57.

58. Loading into vehicles is taking place nearby.

59. Work in a quarry does not stop at night. For this, backlighting works on excavators.

60.

61. UFO.

62. The 55-ton BelAZ trucks used in the quarry are relatively small, and by miners' standards, they are just babies. Someday I will definitely look at the work of 320-ton trucks!

63. Night quarry and factory are beautiful!

Separately, I want to say about the people with whom I worked for two shooting days. Open, kind, cheerful miners, happy to talk about their work and equipment. Real men!
Thanks to all staff

Limestone is a sedimentary rock composed of calcium carbonate. Due to the low labor intensity of mining, the large distribution in industries, limestone is mined quite often. There is limestone rock on all continents, with the only exception, perhaps, being Australia. The largest amount of the breed is found in the USA. Limestone deposits were formed at different geological times, so the sizes of the layers vary from 2-3 centimeters to 100 meters.

Varieties of limestone.

Firstly, limestone is classified according to its composition: In nature, there is pure limestone and with an admixture. Pure limestone, as we said, has the chemical formula of calcite. The breed can also be mixed with the following elements:

• Silicon
• Magnesium
• clay particles
• Double Calcium

The color of the limestone rock may be different. But, as a rule, limestone has the following types of colors:

• White
• Grey
• Brown
• Black

Limestone is also classified according to the way the rock was formed.

• Shell rock. The formation of the rock occurred by the accumulation of shells of shells. It has an unstable crumbled character, in everyday life it is called chalk.
• Travertine is a limestone that appeared thanks to chemical reaction decomposition of calcite. In the case when the rock in this form has a spongy structure, it is called tuff.
• Marl is a combined mixture of potassium carbonate and clay.

Limestone extraction methods.

The world's first limestone mining method was the breaking method. They called it that because the rock was removed with crowbars, and then the stones were knocked out of the formation with hammers. In the modern world, an alternative to the old-fashioned method of limestone mining has appeared.

So, the first way is by blasting. The breed turns into small crumbs. The excavator collects it, loads it into dump trucks and they are already transporting the limestone to the plant, where it will be processed and cleaned.

The second way. Thanks to the development of a special device for an excavator, limestone can be mined without explosion. The driver changes the bucket to an attachment to loosen the rock and crush the limestone in a matter of seconds. This method is used in areas with high population density.

The third method is mining with a milling machine. This is the most cost effective way. At the same time, the extraction and grinding and transportation of the rock take place at once.

Scope of limestone.

Limestone has a wide range of applications in many industries. In the food industry, limestone is used to process sugar. In ferrous metallurgy for the processing of nepheline ores. In animal husbandry, limestone is used for the manufacture of feed and feed for animals and birds. Pulp and paper industry, oil, coke, glass, rubber, paint and varnish - limestone is one way or another involved in these industries. However, limestone has the greatest value in construction. It is used as building lime, concrete, plaster and other building mixtures. She also does tiling work.