Coaltech Status
Current Projects
Integrated Mining and Processing
Organization : Wits University
Project M2025-2:
Safe Blast Criteria for Homes near Mines
Start Date: 01 April 2025
Planned Completion Date: 31 July 2027
South African mines set blast limits using a United States standard written for American housing, so there is no local evidence on what vibration and air blast levels actually damage local homes. Two purpose-built test houses at the Khwezela Colliery carry seismographs and crack monitors, recording how the structures respond to each blast and, separately, to seasonal weather. The result will be the first locally validated criteria for judging whether community damage complaints are genuinely blast related.
Organization : Digital Twin
Project M2026-1:
Digital Twin for Coal Mining Operations
Start Date: 01 April 2026
Planned Completion Date: 31 March 2027
Coal mines have been slow to adopt digital and AI tools, partly because there is no consistent way to compare the options or judge what they are worth. An evaluation platform and a library of modernisation and digitisation options are being built, so a mine can screen candidates against its own financial and non-financial criteria including cost, operational efficiency and safety. Members gain a shared, sector-specific basis for prioritising digital investment.
Organization : RIIS
Project M2026-2:
Wearable Technologies for Mine Safety
Start Date: 01 April 2026
Planned Completion Date: 31 March 2027
Wearable safety devices are widely marketed to mines, but adoption often fails because the technology is chosen before anyone establishes what mineworkers and supervisors actually need. Desktop research and contextual mapping are followed by structured on-site interviews and behavioural science work to establish what a wearable would have to do, and then by validation of requirements and operating constraints. The output is a specification and adoption roadmap for the industry rather than a product trial.
Organization : University of Cape Town
Project P2025-1:
Waste to Resource: Washability of Coal Discards
Start Date: 01 April 2025
Planned Completion Date: 31 March 2027
Coal discard dumps hold material too poor to burn, yet it may still contain recoverable value alongside harmful sulphur minerals. Re-washed discards from Witbank Seams 4 and 5 are being sampled, characterised and put through sink-and-float separations to map washability, meaning how the material splits when separated by density. Techno-economic and environmental assessment then shows where pre-concentration of pyrite and other minerals of interest is worth pursuing.
Organization : North-West University
Project P2026-1:
Discard Dewatering Technologies
Start Date: 01 April 2026
Planned Completion Date: 28 February 2027
Fine coal discard leaves processing plants as a wet slurry that is awkward to store, handle or sell, and the water in it is lost. Drainage boxes and both pressure and vacuum filtration rigs are being built and tested on fine discard to establish which combination removes the most water at acceptable cost. Plants get a practical dewatering strategy that recovers water and makes fine discard easier to reuse or dispose of safely.
Surface Environment
Organization : University of Pretoria
Project E2024-1:
Irrigation of Natrophile Grass Species
Start Date: 01 April 2024
Planned Completion Date: 30 April 2027
Some collieries hold large volumes of sodium-rich mine-affected water with few disposal options. At the Isibonelo Mine, grasses that tolerate high sodium are irrigated with that water while soil salinity, growth rate and forage quality are tracked across summer and winter, using near-infrared spectroscopy to check quality at scale. Results show whether the biomass is safe as livestock feed or compost feedstock, and whether the practice builds soil carbon rather than degrading land.
Organization : University of Pretoria
Project E2025-2:
Irrigation as a Mine Water Management Strategy
Start Date: 01 April 2025
Planned Completion Date: 31 October 2028
Mines in the Mpumalanga coalfields need somewhere for mine-affected water to go, and irrigation is one of the few options that puts it to productive use. Building on eight successive seasons of commercial-scale irrigation records, crop screening trials are run and productivity and environmental effects are monitored on both unmined and rehabilitated land, and the existing best-practice guidelines are revised. The final report sets out when irrigation can serve as a routine water management strategy and within what limits.
Organization : University of Cape Town
Project E2025-3:
Local Brines as Secondary Sources of Battery Metals
Start Date: 01 April 2025
Planned Completion Date: 31 March 2029
Brines left over from treating mine water are a disposal headache, yet they contain lithium, sodium and rare earth elements that South Africa currently imports. Work begins by measuring what is actually present in brines from local coal processing operations and reviewing published extraction routes, then tests freeze and cooling crystallisation, which uses controlled chilling to separate dissolved salts, to enrich lithium and recover sodium. The industry learns whether brine can become a revenue stream instead of a liability.
Organization : ARC Innovations
Project E2026-1:
Waste Liner Innovation for Mine Closure
Start Date: 01 April 2026
Planned Completion Date: 30 September 2027
Mine closure needs low-permeability liners to keep water away from waste, and these are normally built from quarried or imported clay. Liners are instead being formulated from industrial residues, combining water treatment residuals with burnt and unburnt coal reject, and each mix is measured for how slowly water passes through it against the range required for closure liners, alongside its ability to buffer acidity. Work ends with optimised formulations and a costed, pilot-ready assessment.
Future Technologies
Future Technologies
At Coaltech, we’re always looking ahead to explore the next wave of innovation in the mining industry. Our Future Technologies section will highlight cutting-edge research and groundbreaking projects focused on revolutionizing mining practices. From renewable energy solutions and AI-powered mining technologies to sustainable resource management and advanced material sciences, these projects aim to create a more efficient, eco-friendly, and technologically advanced future for the mining sector.
Organization : University of the Free State
Project F2025-1:
Agrivoltaics for Rehabilitated Mine Soils
Start Date: 01 June 2025
Planned Completion Date: 30 June 2028
Rehabilitated coal mine land is often too degraded to farm, and topsoil for repair is scarce. Fixed solar panel structures are being erected over test plots to see whether the shade, reduced evaporation and harvested rainwater beneath them create a microclimate in which vegetation will establish on poor soil and bare spoil. Screening trials, soil and weather monitoring and a digital model produce guidance for combining energy generation, grazing and land recovery.
Organization : University of Johannesburg
Project F2026-1:
Mapping Dumps for Resource Recovery
Start Date: 01 April 2026
Planned Completion Date: 30 November 2026
Legacy discard dumps are being reprocessed to recover leftover carbon for burning, but what remains afterwards is still treated purely as waste. Samples from four points in a Mpumalanga reprocessing plant are analysed to measure critical elements including rare earths, to identify which minerals host them, and to test whether heavy liquid density separation concentrates them further. Findings tell metallurgists and process engineers whether a recovery route is worth designing.
Organization : Mintek
Project F2026-2:
Critical Materials Recovery from Coal Ash
Start Date: 01 April 2026
Planned Completion Date: 31 December 2028
Coal ash is produced in enormous quantities and mostly dumped, yet it carries rare earths and other critical metals. An entire separation flowsheet is being worked on ash samples: characterisation, grinding and size classification, magnetic separation, acid digestion and water leaching of the non-magnetic fraction, iron removal, then solvent extraction to produce a rare earth concentrate. A masters and a doctoral student are trained alongside, and the industry gets a tested recovery route.
Organization : Wits University
Project F2026-3:
Viability of Ash-based Rare Earth Extraction
Start Date: 01 April 2026
Planned Completion Date: 31 July 2027
Recovering rare earths from coal ash is chemically awkward because the metals are locked inside glassy mineral phases that resist normal leaching. A sequence designed to break that structure open is being tested: sample collection and characterisation, calcination and hydrothermal treatment to make the ash more reactive, then optimisation of acid leaching, precipitation and finally solvent extraction to separate individual elements. The work establishes whether the route is technically viable at laboratory scale.
The Energy Transition Twin
A digital twin of the Mpumalanga coalfields: mines, power stations, water, land and livelihoods in one interactive model of how the energy transition could unfold on the ground.
Open the Energy Transition Twin →