Technological and profitable analysis of airlifting in deep sea mining systems

Abstract

Airlifting technology utilized in deep-sea mining (DSM) industry was proposed in the 70s of last century, which was triggered by the discovery of vast amounts of mineral resources on the seabed. The objective of this paper is to assess the technological feasibility and profitability analyses in terms of solid production rate, energy consumption per tonnage of mineral, and profitability per tonnage of mineral. The effects of submergence ratio, pipe diameter, particle diameter, mining depth, and gas flux rate are investigated. The analysis is based on a numerical calculation performed in a Matlab environment. The research reported in this paper can assist to select an optimal transport plan for DSM projects depending on its solid production rate, energy consumption, and profitability.