How Wolverine Fuels navigates market uncertainty with proven mine planning software – Hexagon

By Neville Judd

A number one U.S. coal producer is navigating immediately’s market uncertainty with a mine planning software program platform that traces its origins to 1970. Utah-based Wolverine Fuels optimises its operations utilizing Hexagon MinePlan. 

“It’s very slick,” says Wolverine Fuels’ Senior Vice President, Patrick Barrett, of Hexagon MinePlan Schedule Optimiser (MPSO). The corporate makes use of MPSO to satisfy complicated mixing necessities whereas maximising internet current worth (NPV). 

Wolverine Fuels produces between 6.5 to 10 million tons of thermal coal yearly, serving the western U.S. power-generation business, industrial buyer segments, and export markets. The corporate operates two lively longwall mining complexes, Sufco and Skyline, and is growing a 3rd mine, Fossil Rock. 

The fluctuating value of coal and market volatility current important challenges. Wolverine Fuels must steadiness trade-offs between maximising NPV, assembly contractual obligations, and minimising operational prices and dangers. 

“Due to our restricted footprint, to handle stock, to make buyer blends to satisfy their high quality wants, we are going to really ship the product offsite, retailer it in a separate location, make the mix, put it on a truck or railcar, and ship it to our clients,” says Barrett. 

“Attempting to do this with out the usage of software program akin to MinePlan Schedule Optimiser would require a number of assets that take lots of time, lots of spreadsheets, and would most likely not give us one of the best optimum end result.” 

Model the whole mine-to-market course of with MinePlan Schedule Optimiser 

The challenges dealing with Wolverine Fuels are neither new nor unusual. A mine’s capability to optimise its cutoff grade and materials routing technique, to satisfy high quality/amount targets, and to combine its extraction plan with a haul plan and a dump plan is vastly essential to the mine plan and, by extension, the worth of the enterprise. 

MPSO is positively disrupting the mining panorama by dealing with all of those targets in a single product, permitting the analysis of a number of options, blends and mine sequences a lot quicker than earlier than. This system works with a number of materials sorts, scheduling courses, reserve classification, and rock sorts, giving the engineer the chance to analyse particulars that won’t have been mirrored within the plans. 

Wolverine Fuels used MPSO to mannequin the whole mine-to-market course of, together with the extraction, processing, storage, and distribution of coal. The configuration of MPSO included financial parameters akin to income, prices, money circulation, and low cost price, in addition to technical and operational constraints like manufacturing, processing, storage, and transportation capacities. 

Moreover, MPSO accounted for high quality parameters akin to ash, sulfur, moisture, and calorific worth, together with the mixing necessities for every buyer vacation spot. 

Mastering exterior elements helps to maximise mine worth 

MPSO’s implementation introduced important advantages to Wolverine Fuels, enabling it to successfully handle exterior elements. Wolverine Fuels efficiently met the amount and high quality targets for every buyer vacation spot whereas optimising the mixing of coal from a number of sources. The corporate diminished prices and improved money circulation, maximising the worth of the mine. 

By making use of the suitable low cost price and accounting for the time worth of cash, Wolverine Fuels may precisely calculate NPV. MPSO’s sensitivity evaluation and trade-off evaluation options allowed Wolverine Fuels to match and consider totally different eventualities and options. The corporate enhanced the robustness and adaptability of its plan by incorporating market and operational uncertainties and dangers. 

Wolverine Fuels’ expertise with MPSO demonstrates the numerous advantages of utilizing superior optimisation instruments. By assembly amount and high quality targets, evaluating NPV, evaluating totally different eventualities, and enhancing the reliability and adaptability of its mine plan, Wolverine Fuels set a benchmark for environment friendly and worthwhile mining operations. 

“We run a number of eventualities,” says Barrett. “As we’re varied other ways to develop and increase and do issues in another way, on the contact of our fingers in an hour and a half, versus months or weeks of spreadsheet information, it spits out a end result. It provides us current operations clients in addition to new outputs and adjustments the best way we might mix issues, logistically transfer issues, and completely generates one of the best output.  

“It’s a improbable software. I don’t know what we’d do with out it.” 

• For our full interview with Patrick Barrett, click on here. 

• To learn the case examine, click on here 

Throughout 2025 we’ll be running a blog in regards to the challenges dealing with the mining business. Drawing upon insights from thought leaders in our buyer group and from inside Hexagon, we’ll share how trusted partnerships and confirmed expertise are addressing these challenges, serving to to enhance security and lower prices whereas balancing the calls for of productiveness and sustainability.