From the Lab to the Loading Dock Blog

In 1960, the Lorado Mill was abandoned in northern Saskatchewan, leaving an estimated 227,000 cubic meters of radioactive uranium tailings that covered the mill site and flowed into nearby Nero Lake. In 2008, SRC was contracted to clean up the site, which began a multi-year journey to reduce the risk to human health, wildlife, and aquatic life.

A new joint study by members of Canada's Oil Sands Innovation Alliance (COSIA) looks at how slurry pipelines behave while operating in laminar flow. The results of the study will lay the foundation for developing a reliable model for laminar operation of slurry pipelines that could be used to design pipelines that can effectively transport thickened tailings.

The versatility of rare earths has led to their use in an ever-increasing variety of applications in new technologies. Consequently, demand for rare earths has increased significantly. Everybody wants to extract rare earths because they’re so important, but metallurgical processing is complicated and comes at a high cost.

Caitlin Taylor, the Saskatchewanderer, toured SRC's diamond lab and shares her experience learning about the diamond extraction process.

When people think of Saskatchewan, diamonds don't often come to mind. Well, give your head a shake. Saskatchewan has one of the world's largest diamond labs at it's attracting international attention.

Every mining and mineral processing industry requires the transport of slurries somewhere in their process. However, slurry transport theory and design are topics not adequately covered by undergraduate engineering fluid mechanics courses.