YUAN Liang, Engineer-in-Chief of Huainan Mining Group, recently revealed that a number

of institutions, including National Coal Gas Control Center, Huainan Mining Group, China

University of Mining and Technology, and Anhui University of Architecture, have jointly

developed a technology to harvest both coal and gas at the mining site with low gas

penetration potentials. As a major technological progress for efficient and safe mining

activities, the technology is designed to mine the key distress layers, before kicking off a

full-fledged coal pillar free distress mining, in an attempt to increase gas penetration

potentials, and reduce possible gas explosions. It allows a safe and efficient mining under

the condition of high gas, stress, and low gas penetration potential, harvesting both coal

and gas with a greatly reduced mining cost. The technology also raises coal recovery rate,

and finds a fundamental solution to safe mining. Statistics show that the novel technology

has made Huainan Mining Group create a world record of recovering 360,000 tons of coal

a month, with a gas recovery rate as high as 70%, a reduced morality from 4.01 per million

tons of coal to 0.15, and a raised mechanization from 28% to 91%. The proprietary

technology has applied for 7 patents.