Waste materials generated by mining activities are always a serious environmentalproblem. Proper disposing large amounts of waste material from mining is of greatimportance, especially from an environmental point of view. Numerous methods have beendeveloped to solve this problem. Among these methods, high-density tailings disposal, suchas surface paste technology, is nowadays becoming widely used because of its manypotential benefits. One important challenge in paste management is to predict the evolvinggeometry and flow behaviour of the tailings stack during deposition. It is thereforenecessary to characterize the flow properties of the paste. This study investigated the flowbehaviour of paste materials composed of different ratios of water, waste materials, andcement. Rheology was measured to characterize the yield behaviour of the pastes. Themeasurements showed that 75% solid concentration, where the yield stress of the paste wasapproximately 46 Pa, was the criticalpulp solid ratio (PSR). At higher solids concentrations,the yield stress increased sharply and reached approximately 250 Pa, which is consideredthe limit yield stress for surface paste disposal applications.
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