Mechanics of tailings pond management: computational fluid dynamics & plasticity theories - EC1

Description Tailings ponds are man-made lakes that have serious consequences for environment. Mining and oilsands industries are the main producers of these ponds to store the tailings. These ponds are stratified where the heavier material (e.g. sand) settles to the bottom, freeing up water at the top. However, there is a graded suspension beneath the water cap from fine fluid tailings (FFT) to mature fluid tailings (MFT) which are stable suspensions that do not appear to consolidate significantly over timescales of 10-100 years. This prevents reclamation of landscapes and leaves continuing legacy challenges for tailings pond management. The behaviour of FFT/MFT can be described by visco-plastic rheological mode<\p> Key Objectives Literature survey on withdrawing a fluid from a poolAdapt CFD tools for numerical simulation of the problemRevisit plasticity theories relevant to the indentation/punching a surfacePost-process and compare the results to develop a mathematical modelPropose potential improvements to the withdrawing operational design