Abstract:

This paper intends to present different models for the decision-making process in mining enterprises. In the beginning, the most significant models for determining the optimal drilling research programs for mineral deposits are presented. The paper first introduces four models dedicated to solving different problems raised by the needs of the geological practice, such as the number of drillings that must be executed in certain areas to obtain maximum efficiency, the number of drillings necessary to be executed in the extension of each deposit to ensure a total given efficiency and to minimize the execution expenses, the total investment available that is optimally distributed on certain areas, for geological research, to obtain a maximum economic effect, and the number of drilling necessary to be executed in each area, when the investment fund is given, in such a way as to obtain amounts of information as close as possible to the optimal ones for achieving optimum exploration in mining industry. The analysis continues with presenting the fifth model when it is assumed that the exploration of a deposit is done through a certain number of fixed drillings in an established network as each drilling can be assigned an a priori probability of intercepting a vein and it is hoped that after a certain number of drillings the vein will be discovered. The rest of the paper is dedicated to models regarding the exploitation of poor resources and how determining the optimal value of the parameters can be made. In doing this, the first model is based on the calculation of the total costs related to the geological block, determining the dependence of the total exploitation costs of a deposit on the corresponding quantity and implicitly on the duration of exploitation, while the second model estimates the volume of accumulations of useful mineral substance that will have to be identified so that, depending on the expected content in the existing useful composition, the extraction to be within acceptable cost limits.