We interviewed Mr. Leigh Montgomery, who is a manager at the Australian “International Explosives Equipment” LLC. He has experience and been working in this sector over 28 years. He is here in Mongolia to introduce the 3rd level of technology on emulsion explosives, which is Australia’s latest technology.
Please introduce yourself and your company to our readers. Tell us about your experiences in this field?
I studied explosives technology in Perth, Western Australia and I started working in this field in 1986. Therefore, I’ve been working at the explosives plant for almost over 18 years. I have about 28 total years of experience. I worked in several countries such as Indonesia, New Zealand and America all in this field.When I worked in America , I gained experience with heavy chemical technology for about 3 years. For the last 7 years I have been working at the “International Explosives Equipment” LLC.
Our company was established in 1981 and has over 30 years of experience in this field. We started with maintaining the equipment for the explosives plants, and thencontinued with providing critical goods and services to the explosives sector worldwide. Now we arethe second gest, world leading explosives equipment manufacturer.
What is special about our company is that we don’t offer our products to our customers that we have already manufactured.We make the unique products which relate to our customer’s needs and the features, conditions and demands ofthat region.
So you are here to introduce andset up the equipment at the emulsion plant. What are the special features and advantages of that technology?
Yes. I have come here to Mongolia to set up and utilize the equipment, which hasthe brand name “Nitronit”, Australian technique and Russian-Australian joint technology, which has been designed tested especially for Siberian conditions, and requested by “Mera” LLC. Our company started working with the Russian company “AZOT” five years ago. In the framework of cooperating, we built 6 emulsion plants and provided the equipment for 25 explosives plants. We now are in the process of setting up two components, which consist of “Non-blasting ingredients (raw material) plant” and “Emulsion mixer trucks”. The trucks carry the manufactured ingredients in separate tanks, and the ingredients mixed as explosives when loaded into the blast holes. So this technology fully meets the safety requirements during the manufacturing, transportation and loading phases of the products.
Also production line is a fully automatic, so it is more productive and saves time and cost. The system is easy to use, safe on environment and minimizes the cost of technology.
How about the capacity of the technology? Mongolia has an extreme and harsh climate. So do you think does it suit in that condition when manufactured in Australia, a tropical climate?
In the first time, we set up our equipment in the minus 400C condition in Kemerov, Russia in 2006. At the beginning we faced some problems and we went back to Australia without setting up the equipment. Since then, we changed our products in order to fit in that condition. There have not been any problems since then in that plant. Since then, a lot of equipment was sold and utilized in Russian explosive plants. Mongolia and Russia have similar climates, therefore there will not be problems. It’s designed to work from +100- 400C degrees. The equipment is similar to that which was set up in Kemerov, but updated. The capacity is, producing 9 tons explosives per hour. Usually, the maximum capacity is 13-15 tons per hour.
What are the factors to produce the qualified emulsion explosives?
Provide safe, standardized and qualified products, security, human resource capacity, and the quality of raw materials. All of these factors influence the product quality. Also, it can be the strength properties of the in-situ rock mass, soil texture, managing the demands of clients, minimizing the cost of the products and being safe for the environment.
The T12 Emulsion explosive plant in Ukhaa Hudag of Tavantolgoi coking mine on the territory of Tsogttsetsii soum, Umnugobi province, has a modern laboratory where it can control the material’s quality and changed its ingredients if necessary. Therefore, highquality products are produced that are compatible for client’s demands.
How is the development of the explosivesproduction technology going?
As I mentioned earlier, wetend to produce more products at a low cost, with high standard of safety, environmentally safe and minimizing the manual work. Automatic technology is becoming the standard in modern production.
If there is much waste and non beneficial cost of production, there are more harmful effects on the environment. With the technology of the T12 plant, there is no industrial waste. There is less nitrogen gas volume in the air. The explosives are only manufactured when loaded into the blast hole, so there are highly standardized. So that means there is no need to control of the guards and Internal Troops Division representatives when we transport the explosives. So you can say this qualifies as the latest in emulsion explosive and an international high standard technology.
Thank you for coming and giving us this interview.