• The solution, developed by the MAXAM team in Canada, allows loading explosives in blastholes through a plastic liner, preventing nitrate leaching and protecting the environment.
• The Santa Barbara Innovation Awards are addressed to the 6,500 MAXAM professionals worldwide, with the aim of identifying the seeds of future products and services.
MAXAM, a leading global technology company in blasting solutions for mining and civil works, has celebrated the 26th edition of its Santa Barbara Innovation Awards, where the winner was the “Loading wet holes in liners” environmental project, developed by experts from the company in Canada, in collaboration with the mining company Teck Resources.
According to Miguel Ángel Flórez, MAXAM Chief Technology Officer, “The Santa Barbara Innovation Awards are a perfect platform to develop new services and ideas for our clients. This year, the winning project has been recognized for the innovative solution developed, the possibility of being applied in different operations and for responding to customer needs, something in which we constantly at MAXAM.”
Loading wet holes in liners
The award-winning solution this year is based on a need raised by Teck, one of the main Canadian miners and the largest diversified resources company in the country, to improve water quality in its operations at Elk Valley, in British Columbia (Canada). In particular, it involves the use of a plastic liner when loading explosive into the blasthole, so that nitrate is prevented from entering the water.
To develop this system, the team had to modify MAXAM loading units or MSU (Mobile Sensitizing Unit) used in Teck, adding a liner platform controlled with a hydraulic arm, along with other measures to facilitate its use with the maximum safety, such as a digital control panel that controls the process, among others.
In addition to reducing leaching, this solution also brought additional benefits such as allowing a better use of our explosives., since the liner avoids also product filtration through cracks.
With the aim of promoting innovation throughout the organization, MAXAM has rewarded for 26 years those initiatives developed by its professionals that represent an improvement in terms of products or technical processes, management or occupational health and safety.
Learn all the details of the winning project told by its protagonists in the blog of MAXAM Beyond Stories