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CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION

1.0 INTRODUCTION TO INDIAN COAL MINES

The coal reserves in India are estimated to be 206 billion tones, which is about 1%
of the total world coal reserves. With the present level of production, these reserves
would be adequate to sustain for more than 200 years (Bose, 1999). The demand of coal
in the country is increasing year by year as energy sources from different industries and
the projected coal demand during the period 2011-2012 is around 620 million tones. With
the increasing demand of coal, more mechanized opencast mines are coming up.
However, at present only 38% of Indian coal reserves is mineable by opencast mining
within economic limit whereas the remaining 62% is to be exploited by underground
mining. Further, nearly 70% of the total output in underground mines come from age-old
conventional bord and pillar method with basket loading and 28% from SDL & LHD
faces and rest from other methods (Singh, 1999). For a healthy and balanced growth of
coal mining industry in the coming decade, it is essential that underground production
should increase at a more rapid rate (Mishra, 1992). This is possible only by introducing
extensive mechanization in underground mines and adopting new technologies such as
Long wall mining and Blasting Gallery method.

About 50% of coal reserves in India are in seams thicker than 4.5m (Singh, 1999),
which come under the category of thick seams, the exploitation of which is consistently
posing challenges to the mining engineers and for such thick seam Blasting Gallery
method is adopted.

The problem is aggravated by the presence of already developed pillars that are estimated
to be several million tons. Extraction of thick seams by conventional hand section method
is neither productive nor effective from the conservation point of view.

Department of Mining Engineering, A.I.T., Bengaluru. 2017-18

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The percentage of extraction by hand section mining in thick seams is as low as

25-30%. Lot of good grade coal has been lost and million tonnes of coal are standing on
pillars. Sand stowing for working of thick seams can not be considered as an option
because the cost is prohibitive. Sand has become an increasingly scarce commodity along
with timber. At the same time, the coal industry was in search of an economic method for
dealing with standing thick seam pillars.

In order to achieve higher percentage of extraction (70 – 85%) and to overcome

the problems in the extraction of thick seams by conventional bord and pillar method, the
management has thought for a suitable technology.

Charbonnage de France (CdF) suggested Blasting Gallery (BG) method for

extraction of virgin thick seams as well as developed pillars in thick seams. The first BG
panel was started in the country at East Katras Colliery in Jharia Coalfield (BCCL) and
Chora-10 Pit Colliery in Raniganj Coalfield (ECL) in the year 1987 in collaboration with
France. Due to strata problems, the method was not successful at East Katras Colliery
where overriding of the pillars occurred in one panel. Whereas at Chora-10 Pit Colliery,
the method was partially successful giving encouraging results. However, the expected
production and percentage of extraction could not be achieved in both the mines (Pandey
et al., 1992).

The Singareni Collieries Company Ltd. (SCCL) adopted this method in the year
1989 at GDK No. 10 Incline for extraction of coal in virgin area. The method was very
successful resulting in 85% of extraction with high productivity. After that, SCCL
introduced such method in another three mines. Realizing the rate of success in such
mines, BG method of extraction is gearing up its future potentiality.

To make an assessment of two main problems in BG, i.e., spontaneous heating

and strata control, study was taken up in four mines in India.

Department of Mining Engineering, A.I.T., Bengaluru. 2017-18