Pump Industry Awards 2024 Results
The results are in: KSB win Project of the Year at the Pump Industry Awards
With combined panelist judging and public votes, KSB have been announced as the winner for the South Crofty Tin Mine project, with Cornish Metals.
With great ideas and teamwork, goals can be achieved
A team of KSB representatives, accompanied by two members from Cornish Metals (a KSB customer who lead the project using KSB pumps), participated in the prestigious Pump Industry Awards held on Thursday 14th March. This remarkable event celebrates excellence within the industry.
In a highly competitive field, KSB emerged victorious, securing the coveted Project of the Year award. This accolade was fiercely contested, with seven finalists contending for the honour.
The team was in high spirits at winning this award - a shared triumph for both KSB and Cornish Metals. It underscores the paramount importance of effective teamwork in achieving outstanding results.
South Crofty Tin Mine: the project that sparked the nomination process
South Crofty tin mine ceased tin production in 1998 and the workings were allowed to flood to adit level – circa. 60m from surface. Consequently, this requires approximately 8 million cubic metres of water be removed in order to adequately pump the mine out and enable resumption of tin mining from the deepest levels.
Two KSB BSX463/5 950kW borehole pumps were purchased to dewater the mine, each capable of pumping up to 525m³/hr from a maximum depth of 400m. Utilising Variable Speed Drives (VSD’s), both pumps have been installed to their initial first phase depth of 365m and commenced dewatering of the mine from that elevation in November 2023.
The workings at South Crofty are almost 900m deep, with the primary access, New Cooks Kitchen (NCK) Shaft, reaching 769m. NCK Shaft is the focal point of the dewatering and is directly connected to the original pump stations of the mine, with one at 350m from surface, and another at 730m. Having the ability to install the pumps and rising mains from surface, to dewater in a single phase to the first pump station elevation, enables dewatering of the upper half of the mine without the immediate need to conventionally re-access the shaft and extend the pumping column deeper sequentially.
Conventional mine dewatering requires time consuming installation and commissioning of a shaft winding system to facilitate pump installation sequentially deeper as the water levels recede. The ability to install and control the pumps entirely from the surface in advance of any shaft refurbishment accelerates the dewatering of the mine considerably. This improves safety by allowing the re-access works down the shaft to be conducted independently to the dewatering rate and saves considerable energy by enabling the driving head of the water above the pumps to assist in pumping the water out of the mine, taking advantage of the VSD’s efficiency.
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