Hindustan Zinc's Rampura Agucha Mine is a world class orebody that has successfully transitionedfrom an open pit operation to an underground sublevel open stoping with paste backfill operation.The mine currently has two identical paste plants that each can produce between 160-185 m3/hr ofcemented paste backfill. Plant #1 was commissioned in 2014 and plant #2 was commissioned in 2019.The two plants are equipped with Putzmeister piston pumps that pump from the plant to the edgeof the pit, down a borehole to the North and South main ramps and then down the ramps to the topof the underground orebody approximately 500 m below surface. Each plant was designed with anoperating and standby paste pump. Most of the orebody can be reached from these main lines,however, at the extreme north end of the pit, there is portion of the underground orebody that isabove the uppermost underground delivery level and at a significant horizontal distance from themain paste trunk lines.Because of the location of these northern stopes, an overland pipeline to the north of the pit is requiredbefore entering a borehole down to the stoping levels. This lateral distance on surface andunderground would have resulted in very high pressure on the paste pumps, and a decision wasmade to temporarily install the standby pump from plant 2 at a booster station that would allow thenorthern stopes to be reached with a 2 stage pumping system instead of a single stage pumpingsystem.
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