A 3D Geological Model of a Vein Deposit Built by Aggregating Morphological and Mineral Grade Data

• Main Authors: André Sanches, José Almeida, Paulo Sá Caetano, Romeu Vieira
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2017-11-01
• Series: Minerals
• Subjects: morphology model; mineral content model; geostatistical simulation; vein deposits; critical raw materials
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/2075-163X/7/12/234

The objective of this study was to establish a methodology for building a 3D geological model of a mineral vein deposit, encompassing morphology and wolframite content. The available data set includes stope data (vein thickness and wolframite quantity) and borehole data (vein thickness and wolframite modal classes). The data captured from boreholes and stopes differ in terms of their spatial distribution and clustering as well as the size and shape of each sample. Therefore, a specific methodology was designed to combine these two sources of information. The morphology model mapped vein thickness as a vein proportion variable, by applying a two-phase Direct Sequential Simulation (DSS) locally conditioned to borehole data. Regarding the evaluation of wolframite content, the variables are unable to be related directly to each other and are non-co-located. Therefore, a proximity study was made using DSS to build local conditional cumulative histograms (by borehole class and by mine level). The final model of wolframite quantity was generated using Probability Field Simulation. The proposed approach considers the initially identified problems, allowing the mineral potential of the deposit to be quantified by integrating the results of the two independent methodologies.