Tailings Storage and Heap Leaching in a

Combined Facility A First for the Mining

Industry

Thomas F. Kerr, P.E. Knight Pisold and Co., United States
Michael G. Skurski, P.E. Newmont Mining Company, United States
Peter D. Duryea, Ph.D., P.E. Knight Pisold and Co., United States
ABSTRACT
The La Quinua mill at the Yanacocha mine in Peru has a thickened tailings storage
facility that is contained entirely within an active heap leach pad. In this respect, it is
unique and unprecedented in the mining industry and provides the operator, Minera
Yanacocha S.R.L. (MYRSL), with certain cost, land-use and closure efficiencies. The
combined design requires that the leach ore embankments retaining the tailings
provide the same high level of stability and security required of major tailings dams.
Contrary to standard tailings dam construction, the leach ore in these embankments is
placed in thick, uncompacted lifts so that they maintain adequate permeability for
leaching. The resultant loose structure makes static and dynamic liquefaction a critical
issue, and the key design principle for avoiding a liquefaction related failure is to keep
the ore that is saturated or very near saturated when under leach well removed from
the outer faces of the embankments and contained behind large unsaturated structural
shells. Thus, the design and operational effort has become largely one of keeping
these shells adequately drained and below fully saturated. The facility was
successfully commissioned in early 2008 and its performance to date has met or
exceeded all design objectives. The first phase of expansion, Phase 2, has been
designed and will be developed by late 2009.
Introduction
The La Quinua tailings are produced at the back end of the counter current decantation
(CCD) circuit associated with the mill. The tailings are thickened to a solids content of
approximately 67 percent by weight in the last CCD stage before being disposed within
the active La Quinua heap leach pad (HLP). The thickened tailings storage facility
(TTSF) was commissioned in April 2008, and approximately 5.6 million dry metric
tonnes (mdmt) of tailings have been placed in the facility during its first year of
operation. The facility was originally designed to accommodate 45 mdmt of tailings
1
produced at a nominal rate of 5.0 mdmt per year over a nine year period but has
flexibility to be expanded to over 50 mdmt. Studies are ongoing to confirm the
necessity of this additional storage capacity.

The TTSF is unique in that it is located within an active HLP and uses leach ore,
strategically placed within specific lines and grades, to form the tailings embankments.
The HLP has been in operation since 2001 and has been expanded in seven stages,
generally in a north to south direction over the natural topography that rises upward to
the south. Through the first quarter of 2009, approximately 390 mdmt of leach ore has
been loaded onto the HLP, and at its final installed capacity it will contain over
530 mdmt. The north to south development presented the opportunity for changing the
loading plan in the latter stages to contain the tailings in the south side of the HLP after
MYSRL made the decision to develop the La Quinua mill. Stages 5 and 6 of the HLP
were re-configured by placing the ore into east and west zones thereby leaving a
central area open that became the TTSF. The east and west zones now form the main
tailings containment embankments. Containment on the north side is provided by the
main body of the HLP developed in Stages 1 through 5, and containment on the south
side is provided by the natural topography. A general plan of the TTSF and HLP is
shown on Figure 1.


Figure 1 - Plan of the La Quinua Operation and Thickened Tailings
Storage Facility

The TTSF will be developed in three phases. Phase 1, which is currently in operation,
has leach ore embankments up to elevation 3612 meters (m), or to a maximum height
of approximately 50 m, which provides storage for 10 mdmt of tailings. This amount of
2
storage will be used up in January 2010. Phase 2, which is now under development,
will have embankments up to 3644 m and will increase the storage capacity to nearly
29 mdmt. This capacity will be reached in January 2013. Phase 3 will be developed in
2012 up to the final elevation of the TTSF, which is still to be determined depending on
the required final tailings and leach ore capacities. The original design of the TTSF
had a final elevation at 3660 m, but most likely the actual elevation will be between
3665 and 3675 m, which will make the final maximum height of the embankments
between 100 and 115 m.
Overview of Design and Operations to Date
The tailings are thickened in a high rate thickener acting as the final stage of the CCD
circuit and then transported to the TTSF through one of two 1.5 kilometer (km) long, 12-
inch-diameter, unlined, steel pipelines that are fed by one of two centrifugal pump
trains. The tailings are deposited into the TTSF from multiple drop bars comprising 8-
inch diameter high density polyethylene (HDPE) pipes located on approximately 50 m
centers that extend down into the basin from 14-inch diameter HDPE distribution pipes
running around the inside crest of the leach ore embankments. One distribution pipe is
above the east side of the impoundment and a second one is above the north and west
sides. The drop bars convey the slurry down onto the tailings beach to prevent it from
eroding the faces of the embankments. This is important as the upper portions of
these slopes are actively under leach. The drop bars are valve activated from off-takes
on the distribution pipes to allow for controlled placement into the facility. The slurry
discharges out of holes that are drilled by the operators along the top of each drop bar
just ahead of the rising beach, and this leads to some dissipation of energy as the
tailings slurry exits the drop bar onto the tailings beach. The tailings then flow at a
relatively low velocity over the beach, which allows for liquid/solid separation. The
points of active discharge are frequently rotated around the three sides of the TTSF to
form a thin layered, drained and stable tailings deposit against the leach ore
embankments.

The beach is sloped into the south-central area of the facility so that surface water
draining from the tailings and runoff from precipitation is displaced away from the
embankments. A small surface water pond is maintained in the south-central area
directly against a blanket underdrain that covers the lined base of the facility, which
slopes down to a low point in the northwest corner. The underdrain comprises a layer
of free draining gravel within which a network of perforated corrugated polyethylene
tubing (CPT) pipes is installed, and this layer is covered with a geotextile to filter out the
3
tailings solids. The geotextile is covered with another layer of gravel and cobbles for
erosion and ultraviolet protection of the geotextile.

While the surface water pond is being progressively displaced upwards by the rising
tailings, it is kept in continuous contact with the sloping underdrain, which removes the
water from the facility. A series of decant towers has also been installed in the TTSF
as a backup in the unlikely event that the hydraulic capacity of the underdrain is
exceeded by an extreme event or if a portion of the underdrain becomes blinded off.
To date, the decant towers have not been needed. The water removed by the
underdrain and decant towers is conveyed into a pair of concrete encased outlet pipes
that run under the northwest corner of the HLP to a downstream reclaim pond. From
there, the water is recycled to the mill.

Filling of the tailings basin is at an early stage. Initial deposition commenced from drop
bars in the northwest corner, i.e., the lowest part of the basin, and as the deposit
advanced upward and outward the adjacent drop bars on either side were
progressively brought into use. The objective was to place new tailings over the
existing deposit established from the last set of drop bars in order to avoid tailings
slurry running over the underdrain. The initially placed tailings in the northwest corner
were unable to achieve any appreciable liquid/solid separation or form a beach due to
the small area available. To prevent large amounts of water from decanting into the
leach ore embankments and potentially causing erosion of the ore and dilution of
pregnant solution in the HLP, a geomembrane was installed on the face of the
embankments in this corner. The geomembrane was extended up to elevation 3580
m, and when the tailings deposit reached the top of the geomembrane, a sloping beach
had been developed against the embankments that displaced the surface water pond
away from them.


Photo 2 - View to the west along the
north side of the TTSF showing the
tailings beach developed against the
leach ore embankments
Photo 1 - View to the west along the
south side of the TTSF basin showing
the small surface water pond in the
south-central area in contact with the
underdrain blanket layer on the lined
base of the facility
4



Photo 3 - View looking east showing
that good liquid/solid separation is
occurring over the tailings beach and
clear water is present in the surface
water pond against the sloping
underdrain blanket
Photo 4 - Close up view of clear water
discharging from the outlet pipe from the
TTSF underdrain



The program of continuously rotating the active points of tailings deposition around the
beach perimeter has been in use for approximately 6 months, and at the end of the first
quarter of 2009, the top of the beach had reached elevation 3594 m. The average
density of the deposit was approximately 1.53 tonnes per cubic meter (T/m
3
), which is
slightly in excess of the design value of 1.50 T/m
3
. Modeling indicates the overall dry
density of the deposit will progressively increase to 1.65 T/m
3
over the next few years
as the rate of rise decreases. Figure 2 presents the filling curve for the TTSF, in terms
of elevation versus dry tonnage of tailings deposited, based on the design densities. A
few actual filling points are shown in the lower left hand corner, and as can be seen
they are in good agreement with the design curve. The currently planned phases of
expansion are depicted by the stepped line.










5
Figure 2 - TTSF Filling Curve and Staged Development Phases

Vibrating wire piezometers were installed in the lower portion of the tailings deposit at a
height of 2.5 m above the underdrain (on stands placed above the underdrain) and in
the underdrain during Phase 1 construction. Figure 3 shows a timeline plot of the
measured pore pressures in the tailings and in the underdrain.


Figure 3 - TTSF Basin Piezometer Readings

The piezometers in the underdrain (06, 08, 10 and 14) are registering pore pressures
at near zero values, which indicates that the drain is operating at atmospheric pressure
as designed. The piezometers in the lower tailings (07, 09, 11 and 15) are showing
slightly higher pore pressures in the 1 to 3 m (of water) range but these values are well
below hydrostatic pressures thereby indicating that the tailings, while saturated, are
well drained and consolidated and passing seepage flow downward to the underdrain.
These results indicate that the seepage gradient into the underdrain is approximately
1.5, and based on a coefficient of permeability of the lower tailings of 2.910
-5

centimeters per second (cm/sec) from laboratory tests conducted during the design, the
calculated rate of vertical drainage from the tailings into the underdrain is about 0.09
cubic meters per second (m
3
/sec) over the approximately 205,000 square meters (m
2
)
inundated by tailings at the time these measurements were taken. This represents a
6
fraction of the total flow discharging from the underdrain, the remainder being decanted
water from the small surface water pond.
Leach Ore Characteristics and Dynamic Stability of
Embankments
Leach Ore Embankments
Combining heap leach and tailings storage into a single facility changed the operating
dynamics of what had previously been only a heap leach operation. Two key design
challenges for the TTSF were that:

The leach ore embankments would continue to be loaded and leached but this
would now happen concurrently with tailings deposition, which provides certain
interfacing, logistical and solution management issues, and
The leach ore would be placed into the embankments in thick, uncompacted
lifts (to enhance leaching), which is contrary to the fill placement in typical
tailings dams, but despite this the embankments would still need to meet
rigorous safety standards set by Newmont, Knight Piesold and the international
mining community, particularly under earthquake loading.

These challenges were met by: (1) configuring the embankments to have wide cross
sections (to support ore loading and leaching) thus creating large structural shells that
would remain unsaturated, (2) placing coarser and finer ores in selected locations to
create zones in the embankments adapted from the heap design, (3) thickening the
tailings to reduce the amount of water entering the TTSF, and (4) using a rotational
tailings deposition method to build well drained and stable beaches against the
embankments.

Zones in the embankments that comprise coarser and finer ores are described below.

Zones A and C with up to 15 percent fines that includes higher quality run-of-
mine (ROM) ore is well drained and unsaturated even when under leach. Zone
A is a coarse grained, 50-meter wide zone placed on the exposed ultimate
downstream face of the embankment with minimum 50 percent gravel content;
Zone C is placed a minimum of two 16-meter lifts thick at the base of the
embankment over the leach pad.
Zone B with up to 20 percent fines forms the majority of the ore in the
embankments in their middle elevations.
7
Zone D with up to 25 percent fines may be produced by mixing (on a truck by
truck basis) higher fines content ore with lower fines content ore. This zone
generally comprises the last two lifts placed on the heap and, while not part of
the original design for the embankments, is being considered in current studies.
Seepage and Stability Analyses
The key design principle for stability is to keep saturated or near saturated areas of
leach ore in the embankments well removed from the outer faces and contained behind
the large structural shells. By keeping the leach ore in the shells well drained and less
than fully saturated at all times, including when the embankments are under leach,
liquefaction by static or dynamic loading will be prevented. Thus, the design effort
became one of keeping these shells unsaturated. Finite element seepage modeling
using the computer program SEEP/W (GEO-SLOPE, 2004a) was conducted to define
the zones of potential saturation in the embankments.

Available data with respect to the saturated hydraulic conductivity of the La Quinua ore
were largely derived from testing a large number of samples in a previous study with
samples selected to represent a substantial range of fines contents. During later
analyses, conductivity versus depth relationships were developed from those
laboratory data for the subset of samples that were considered to be representative of
the ore types currently of interest (e.g., Zones A/C, Zone B, and Zone D). These
relationships were further refined by calibrating the hydraulic/seepage model results
against the observed field performance of the Stage 1 heap. In the seepage modeling
presented later in this report, the TTSF embankments were subdivided into depth
regions on 16-meter increments in accordance with the predominant lift thickness.
Appropriate saturated hydraulic conductivities were then assigned to each depth range.
Once a saturated conductivity was assigned to each portion of the relevant cross
sections, it was also necessary to define the relationship between hydraulic
conductivity (saturated and unsaturated) and soil suction for input into the variably
saturated seepage model. The van Genuchten-Mualem formulation was adopted for
analyses of the La Quinua facility, which requires definition of five curve fit parameters
including:
s
(theta-s),
r
(theta-r), (alpha), n and m, where m=1-1/n. The previous
laboratory testing program that generated the data on saturated hydraulic conductivity
of the leach ore also included capillary moisture retention testing on most of the
samples. Analyses of these data, once they had been corrected for the removal of
oversize material, yielded the unsaturated flow parameters at two different test
densities for the samples with a range of fines contents. Further evaluation of the data
8
resulted in the recommendations for modeling the Zones A/C, B and D materials. The
resultant combination of saturated hydraulic conductivity and van Genuchten
parameters define the required conductivity versus suction relationship for each
material type and depth increment.

A typical result of the seepage modeling is illustrated on Figure 4. The saturated zone
is shown to be within the center of the embankment contained behind the wedge
shaped structural shells. It is largely contained within the Zone B material while the
Zone C material at the base of the embankment and the Zones A and B materials
forming the outer shells are freely drained and unsaturated. This is consistent with the
design objective. Figure 4 also shows flow vectors and contours of total head that
define the flow regime through the maximum cross section of the west embankment
(crest elevation 3660 m representing the original design) for the case where the full
crest width of the embankment is under leach at the average maximum design solution
application rate of 10 liters per hour per square meter (L/m
2
/hr). The flow regime is
shown to be is gravity dominated with flow lines largely vertically downward and little
lateral spreading.



Figure 4 - Seepage Analysis Results - Crest Elevation 3660

Limit equilibrium static and post-earthquake stability analyses of the embankments
using SLOPE/W (GEO-SLOPE, 2004b) were then completed by importing the pore
pressure data from the seepage files. The pore pressure data included the limits of the
saturated and unsaturated ore together with the pore pressure values at each finite
element node. Following this, dynamic stability analyses under the influence of the
9
maximum credible earthquake for the site, as established by a seismic risk
assessment, were completed using the geomechanical finite difference-modeling
program FLAC (Itasca, 2001). The initial step was to input density, modulus, strength
and pore pressure values to determine the in-situ states of stress in the section under
static loading conditions (self weight loads due to gravity alone). Material properties
and a soil-liner interface strength relationship at the base were input from the results of
extensive test work over several years on the HLP.

In the second stage of the dynamic analysis, the earthquake was applied by entering
an appropriate acceleration time-history and incorporating a liquefaction triggering
subroutine developed for use with FLAC at the University of British Columbia (Beatty
and Byrne, 1999). In that subroutine, a real-time analysis is performed where
triggering of liquefaction is evaluated in each finite difference zone by counting the
number of cycles of shear stress experienced by that zone until a threshold number is
reached. Strength and stiffness values are then re-assigned to the appropriate post-
liquefied value at the moment of liquefaction. A conservative undrained shear strength
(S
u
/p) ratio of 0.10 was selected to represent the strength of the liquefied leach ore.
Experience dictates that this is a conservative (low) value for a material that contains
significant gravel and sand percentages. Additionally, it was conservatively assumed
that the unsaturated leach ore would be subject to cyclic softening under the design
earthquake event, meaning that cyclic loading could generate positive pore pressures
less than those necessary to fully liquefy the material but which still could result in a
decrease in its shear strength. This was accounted for by reducing the friction angle of
the softened material to two-thirds of its original value.
Results of Dynamic Analyses
Results of the model showed the development of several shear bands that closely
parallel the potential critical slip surfaces defined by limit equilibrium slope stability
analyses (not reported in this paper). This close comparison between the two different
models added confidence to the analyses. The shear bands are shown on Figure 5.

10

Figure 5 - Static Stress State of Dynamic Model Zones - Crest Elevation 3660

Additional results from the FLAC analyses, consisting of contours of total deformation,
are shown on Figure 6.

Figure 6 - Post-Earthquake Deformations - Crest Elevation 3660

The predicted permanent deformations at critical locations on the embankment,
including along the underlying liner system and the crest, are small. Maximum
permanent deformations along the liner are predicted to be on the order of 15
centimeters, which should not result in significant damage to the liner or any loss of
containment of process fluids or impounded tailings. Maximum vertical deformations
on the crest of the facility are expected to be less that 25 centimeters, and the facility
will have sufficient freeboard at all times to accommodate well in excess of this. The
model shows that the unsaturated outer shells of the leach ore embankments provide
sufficient strength and stiffness, even after strain softening, to confine the inner
liquefied materials and keep the overall deformations to a minimum.

11
Post-earthquake static stability analyses were completed to estimate the limit
equilibrium factor of safety of the embankment after the earthquake shaking ceases but
with strain softened or liquefied zones remaining (i.e., before the excess pore
pressures generated by the earthquake are dissipated). The results gave factors of
safety in excess of 1.1, a generally accepted minimum, for all but two cases, which
were in an area that will be buttressed by a downstream stage of the HLP (termed
Stage 7). This stage was not modeled. The conclusion was that this stage needed to
be raised to elevation 3548 meters before the leach ore embankments can be loaded
to their ultimate height. Alternatively, this constraint can be described as a maximum
seven-lift-differential between the crest of the TTSF embankment and the crest of the
Stage 7 buttress during incremental loading of the HLP. Stage 7 of the HLP is
currently under construction.
Actual Leach Ore Placement
In 2006, a sonic drill was purchased by MYSRL to aid in definition of fines content in
the leach ore in the La Quinua pit and on the HLP. The purpose of this is to reduce the
risk of placement of out of spec material within specific zones within the HLP and TTSF
embankments. The drilling method was selected based on the requirement for
continuous and maximum sample recovery. Previously this type of rig had been used
successfully in geotechnical and process investigations of the original Stage 1 heap.

Leach ore placed into the early stages of the HLP before implementation of the
zonation described previously would have been classed as Zone B, comprising typical
La Quinua leach ore. Later, Zones A and C, and Zone D represented selective mining,
blending and placement of cleaner and dirtier material, respectively. Review of
leach ore placement data from the sonic rig indicated that there was not adequate
differentiation in the fines contents of the various zones in the TTSF embankments,
e.g., much of the material placed resembled Zone B. It is expected that more intensive
use of the sonic drill as described above, coupled with improvements in ore control
protocols, should improve compliance with the zone characteristics during future ore
placement.

It must be noted that the stability of the HLP and TTSF embankments are strongly
influenced by the zones of saturation and pore pressures within the leach ore.
Monitoring of water levels and positive and negative pressure heads within the
embankments during operations will provide critical feedback with respect to the
performance of these structures relative to that which was predicted (i.e., maintenance
12
of an adequate factor of safety against slope failure). While some analyses of the HLP
and/or TTSF indicated that a reduced leach application rate may be required when fully
loaded, actual operational control will be based on the observed pore pressures and
saturated zones within the embankments. Higher leach application rates and/or the
inadvertent inclusion of higher fines content materials may be acceptable as long as
the threshold levels are not exceeded. Because of the importance of controlling the
process solution level and maintaining structural shells at a sufficiently low degree of
saturation, future efforts will include an emphasis on expansion of the number and
types of instruments within the HLP and TTSF embankments. These may comprise
instruments capable of measuring soil suction as well as pressure head to assess
moisture content (and hence the degree of saturation) via the moisture characteristic
curves already defined for the various leach ore types/embankment zones.
Conclusions
The La Quinua TTSF is unique in that it is located within the La Quinua HLP and uses
heap leach ore, strategically placed within specific lines and grades, to form the
containing embankments. Contrary to standard tailings dam practices these
embankments have been built with leach ore placed in thick, uncompacted lifts and are
subject to leach solution being applied to, and percolating through, them. The loose
structure makes static and dynamic liquefaction potentially a critical issue, and the key
design principle for avoiding a liquefaction related failure is to keep the saturated or
near saturated zones well contained in the embankments behind large structural shells
that are unsaturated at all times. Dynamic analyses have shown that while the
potential for liquefaction or strain softening of some saturated or near saturated zones
in the embankments is predicted under to occur under the maximum credible
earthquake, the predicted deformations would be minimal. Post-earthquake stability
analyses using cyclic strain softened and liquefied strengths also showed that
adequate stability will be maintained. These findings will be confirmed with a
comprehensive geotechnical investigation and follow-up slope stability and dynamic
deformation analyses of the actual materials placed in the TTSF and in the unlikely
event that this indicates conditions markedly different from those discussed herein, the
achievement of non-liquefiable conditions in the structural shell zones of the leach ore
embankments will be established by controlling the leach solution application rate and
verifying with pore pressure and soil suction monitoring.

The advantages of this combined tailings and heap leach facility for its owner were: (1)
reduced capital construction costs, (2) reduced projected operating cost, and (3) ability
13
to meet a 2008 schedule commissioning. While other tailings depositional techniques
and locations were studied, designing and constructing the tailings impoundment within
the HLP proved to be a truly innovative step, which in part defined MYSRLs La Quinua
mill projects success.
References
Beatty, M.H. and P.M. Byrne, 1999, A Synthesized Approach for Modeling Liquefaction
and Displacements, Proceedings of the International FLAC Symposium on
Numerical Modeling in Geomechanics, A.A. Balkema Publishers.
GEO-SLOPE, 2004a, SEEP/W Version 5.20, GEO-SLOPE International Ltd., Calgary,
Alberta.
GEO-SLOPE, 2004b, SLOPE/W Version 5.20, GEO-SLOPE International Ltd., Calgary,
Alberta.
Itasca, 2001, FLAC Version 4.00 - Users Manual, Itasca Consulting Group Inc.
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