Development of a rule-based program for the elaboration of typified ventilation projects for the Spanish mining industry

AITEMIN is a non-profit mining research association whose members are mining companies and mining equipment manufacturers. For the last two years, AITEMIN has been involved in the development of computer programs to solve ventilation networks applied to the Spanish mining environment. That work has resulted in two computer programs that run in microcomputers, which include interactive graphics capabilities and that check that the resulting ventilation air flow complies with the Spanish Mining Law Regulations. Air flow resistance for each ventilation branch is calculated by the program, although the obtained values can be overriden by the user. Both systems are designed for small mines with no more of 100 branches, as it covers over 90% of the Spanish mines and it seems the upper limit of the hardware graphics limitation (640x350 resolution}. A brief description of the programs is presented emphasizing their appropiateness to the Spanish Mining Industry. On the other hand, AITEMIN is one of the few companies in Spain entitled to audit mining projects for the Administration through the Directorate of Mines. Engineers of AITEMIN have been checking ventilation projects for some years as well. All these facts merged in the idea of developing a computer system which should be able to help the mining engineer at the mine site to do ventilation projects to be presented to the Directorate of Mines. The objective of the system is to facilitate the standardization of mining ventilation projects achieving good quality work. The system will direct the user to the important facts and calculations to be made according to the objective of the proposed project. Related Mining Law Regulations are taken into account and mentioned, as the user may not know which rule applies to the specific mining conditions of the case study. Rules derived from the experience from the engineers auditing ventilation projects are alse included. The system is designed to automatically generate the reports in the appropiate format, as required by the Administration. The paper reflects the experience of the development of the system, its structure and contents. The system was initially developed using an expert system shell, written in LISP, incorporating various mathematical functions that provide the needed calculation capability. However, it was later rewritten in compiled BASIC, for speed and versatility sake.