AEL Mining Services, a member of the JSE-listed AECI Group in South Africa, is a leading developer, producer and supplier of commercial explosives, initiating systems and blasting services for mining, quarrying and construction markets in Africa and Indonesia. AEL is also the largest supplier of explosives technology and initiating systems in Africa

With its head office at Moddernfontein in Johannesburg, South Africa, AEL was established in 1896, and has become one of the world's leading suppliers of explosives and initiating systems. AEL Mining Services comprises 16 businesses complimented by production facilities and offices throughout Southern Africa, Africa, and select international regions in South East Asia, South America and Europe.

Annual sales are close on R3 billion with AEL Southern Africa business accounts for 60% of its sales, with the rest of Africa accounting for 33%. The balance made up from global channels, South America and South East Asia sales.

Applications

Using world-class technologies, AEL unearths wealth in the countries in which it operates, providing world class mining solutions in all key mining, quarrying and construction applications, including:

• Open cut - diamonds, platinum, copper


• Open cast - coal, iron ore, manganese


• Underground massive - diamond, nickel


• Underground narrow reef - gold, platinum, uranium


• Dimensional stone quarrying


• Aggregate stone quarrying

Products

AEL offers the latest generation products and service offerings for blasting operations . These include: electronic detonators, centralised blasting systems, shock tube systems, boosters, detonator cords, capped fuse, igniter cord and blasting accessories.

AEL produces and supplies ammonium nitrate and ammonium nitrate solution from its own manufacturing plants. AEL's bulk emulsion manufacturing plants provides the group with the capacity to produce and deliver timeously, even when volume demand increases. AEL also supplies a comprehensive range of packaged explosives.

AEL deploys in-house engineering competency to design and build Mobile Manufacturing Units (MMUs) for surface and underground mining, bulk emulsion manufacturing plants and modular initiating systems assembly plants.

Services

AEL deploys blasting services that extract optimum value from any blasting operation with its blend of products, services and solutions. These include:

• Down the hole services, prime load tie and shoot (PLTS), rock on ground contracting, blast optimisation,

 

• On mine site bulk emulsion manufacturing plants and associated down the blast hole delivery platforms

 

• Underground mobile and static emulsion pumping systems.

 

• Mining optimisation offers blast monitoring, design, timing, fragmentation analysis, basic blasting principle training, technology conversion, explosive engineering diploma, i-Mining mining productivity program and blasting consulting services.
  

Regions

With 16 businesses in AEL Mining Services, the group also has production facilities and offices in South Africa, Egypt, Ghana, Mali, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Zambia, DRC, Zimbabwe, Botswana and Indonesia.

Through its modular operations, AEL has the ability to deploy, set up and mobilise infrastructure in remote regions in a quick turnaround time.

AEL partners, invests and contributes to economies in regions where it operates by meticulously caring for both people and the environment to unearth wealth for current and future generations.

Cutting edge Research & Development

AEL continuously develops cutting edge technology by investing significantly in research and development to bring innovative solutions to the evolving mining and quarrying environments.

With its large team of leading engineers and scientists, AEL has over a century of expertise and knowledge in developing ground-breaking and innovative blasting solutions.

AEL partners with academic institutions to conduct fundamental research that will ultimately benefit industry.

AEL embarked on the Initiating Systems Automation Project (ISAP) in 2006 and has designed, built and commissioned a high speed automated assembly line to deliver high volumes of shock tube product within a significantly reduced cycle time relative to existing manual processes. The project entailed various stages of automation starting with the manufacture of detonators right through to the assembly of final products sold to the market.

AEL is developing the largest automated shock tube manufacture and assembly process, scheduled for completion in 2012, which aims to substantially increase production, improve safety, decrease costs and set an international benchmark for quality.

AEL delivered its first fully automated shock tube blast at Anglo Platinum's Brakspruit Mine in the North West province in South Africa in June 2009, followed by successful field trials of 150 000 units.

The initial blast at Brakspruit marked AEL's adoption of automated shock tube assemblies and comes on the back of the company's conversion of the South African Narrow Reef market from capped fuse to shock tube technology, which is set to improve safety and blasting results in the mining industry.

AEL's Research and Development department has pioneered and patented many world firsts, one of them being the world's first commercial pyrotechnic spray drying plant, which will provide all the delay powders that the company needs for its new multi-million rand automated assembly plant.