New Zealand Mining Glossary
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Location: New Zealand
Surnames/tags: New Zealand Mining
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Mining Glossary
Mining has a language of its own. This might help explain reports and investigations into mining incidents.
- Specific to coal mining, this is a full text, online, searchable book:
- A Glossary of Terms Used In Coal Mining by William Stukeley Gresley, 1883, London, New York, E. & F.N. Spon
Mining Glossary of Terms
| Anthracite | A hard, black, shiny coal, which is very high in fixed carbon and low in volatile matter,hydrogen and oxygen. |
|---|---|
| Biogas | Energy produced from the anaerobic digestion of sewage and industrial waste. |
| Biomass generation | Generation of electricity by the burning of trees and grass crops, forestry and urban. |
| Bituminous coal | A relatively soft dark brown to black coal, lower in fixed carbon than anthracite but higher in volatile matter, hydrogen and oxygen. |
| Brattice | Sacking erected in passageways of underground mines to direct air from main airway. Made from impermanent materials as the roof was progressively allowed to collapse as the coal face advanced. |
| Carbon dioxide | Gas produced through the burning of carbon products [including coal]. |
| Carbon monoxide | Poisonous gas released in the mines following the use of explosive charges to release the coal from the coal face. |
| Carbonisation | The industrial process to reduce coal slack to carbonettes. |
| Carbonisation plant | An industrial plant designed to make profitable use of coal slack. |
| Char | The solid carbonaceous residue that results from incomplete combustion of organic |
| Coal | A hard, black substance, mainly carbonised plant matter found in underground seams and used as a fuel. |
| Coal face | The actively mined area of a coal mine. |
| Coal seam | A layer of coal. |
| Coal tar | A thick, black, oily liquid, distilled from coal and used as a source of benzene. |
| Coking Coal [Coke] | The end product when coal is burned in the absence of oxygen, which reduces volatile gases, leaving almost pure carbon. This is used in industrial steel and aluminium manufacturing in a blast furnace. |
| Creosote | Wood preservative. |
| Drive and drift | Mining method involving vertical mine shaft and horizontal mining of coal. |
| Firedamp | An explosive mixture of gasses of which methane is the predominant part. |
| Fossil fuels | Coal, natural gas and fuels derived from crude oil [including petrol and diesel]. They have been formed over long periods of time from ancient organic matter. |
| Geothermal | Electricity generation by naturally occurring steam. |
| Greenhouse gas | Gases that increase the temperature of the earth‟s surface. These include water vapour, tropospheric ozone, chlorofluorocarbons, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, methane and nitrous oxide. |
| Hydro electric | Electricity generation by water. |
| Lignite | A brownish-black, woody structured coal, lower in fixed carbon than either anthracite or bituminous coal, but higher in volatile matter and oxygen. |
| Longwall mining | Driving underground roads along a continuous block of coal before extracting the entire block on the return journey - accounts for about 50% of the world‟s production of coal. |
| Methane | A flammable gas created by decomposition of organic matter, which is released as the coal is mined. |
| Mine | An excavation in the earth for extracting coal or other minerals. |
| Mine roof | The layer of rock or mineral over an underground mine working. |
| Mine shaft | A passageway allowing access to a mine. |
| Natural gas | Consists mainly of methane occurring naturally in underground deposits. It may be associated or free gas. |
| Opencast mine | Mining by the removal of the surface layers, working the mine from above, rather than from the shafts of a mine. |
| Overburden | Layer of soil and useless rock on top of the coal being mined by the opencast method. |
| Oxygen | A colourless, tasteless, odourless, gaseous element, occurring naturally in most minerals and organic substances. |
| Peat | Vegetable matter decomposed in water and partly carbonised, a precursor to coal which then requires compression. |
| Pit props | Timber supports used to hold up the roof of an underground mine tunnel |
| Pit-head | The entrance to a mine shaft. |
| Slack | Very fine powder, a residue of mining. |
| Spragg | A piece of timber or iron between the spokes of a cart wheel to slow down coal cart. |
| Stopping | A wall erected across the entrance of a worked out or dangerous area, so that air cannot pass into the disused district. |
| Sub-bituminous | A glossy-black made of smaller particles coal that bituminous coal. It has a higher oxygen content than bituminous coal. |
| Subsidence | An area of ground that has sunk due to underground mining beneath. |
| Sulphur | A pale yellow, non-metallic element with a suffocating smell which occurs in coal. |
| Tailings | The waste products after mining. |
| Underground coal gasification | The burning of coal underground without mining and the collection of the gas to a turbine for the generation of electricity. |
| Underground mine | Mining by the removal of coal from an underground tunnel network. |
| Ventilation fans | Fans in the underground mining tunnels used to disperse poisonous gases released during the mining of coal. |
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