General purpose simulation for mine modeling

The mining industry, similar to other industries, is continuously striving to increase productivity and reduce unit costs of production. With the complexity and interconnectivity of the systems involved in a large mining operation, it is often impractical to experiment with the systems themselves. Simulation can be an effective tool in evaluating the effect of changes. The type of simulations carried out will vary depending on the purpose and how the final outcome will be utilized. A simulation may involve a sub-system of the operation or the entire operation. In this thesis two simulation models are considered of varying scales. The first simulation is of a mine hoisting system and the effect that a simple dispatching algorithm can have on the production of the hoist. The second simulation involves the overall simulation of a large scale surface mining operation. The surface mine simulation is verified against published data and then the effects of changes to the base model are investigated.