• Proceedings of the Korea Committee for Ocean Resources and Engineering Conference
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• 2001.10a
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• pp.160-163
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• 2001

In order to develop a nodule conveying system through a flexible pipe out of the deep-seabed manganese nodule miner, an experimental study of the solid-water slurry flow in vertical pipe is performed as the first stage of total experiments. Hydraulic characteristics of the pipe slurry flow such as slip velocity, transport concentration and pressure gradient are investigated for the size of particle, load ratio, and flow rate of water. The higher the load ratio is, the larger the transport concentration and pressure gradient become. The bigger the size of particles is, the larger the pressure gradient becomes. The effectiveness of the flow rate to hydraulic performance is also investigated. This results are to be used for designing crusher and pump, and operating the conveying device.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.155-164
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• 1995

The kriging model, one of the geostatistical models, has been used to evaluate the deep-sea manganese nodule deposits until now. The distribution of the manganese nodule deposits estimated by the model shows the smooth surface as well as much difference from the actual distribution. Subsequently, it estimates the deposit distribution roughly in terms of the limited data of surveyed zone. Therefore, this paper presents the interpretation methodology of the deep-sea manganese nodule deposit distribution by using the fractal model to overcome the problems caused by the geostatistical model. Also, the manganese nodule distributions are interpreted by using the manganese nodule data sampled in the GH82-4 zone, west longitude $165^{\circ}40^{\prime}-169^{\circ}00^{\prime}$, and south latitude $0^{\circ}00^{\prime}-2^{\circ}40^{\prime}$ neighboring Nova-Canton Trough in the Pacific Ocean which was surveyed by the Geological Survey of Japan in 1982.

• Ocean and Polar Research
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.505-514
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• 2014

The development of deep seabed manganese nodules has been carried out with the aim of commercial development in 2023. It is important to forecast the price of the four metals (copper, nickel, cobalt, and manganese) extracted from manganese nodules because price change is a criterion for investment decision. The main purpose of the study is to forecast the price of four metals using the ARIMA model and VAR model, and calculate the MAPE to compare a goodness-of-fit between the two models. The estimated results of the two models reveal statistical significance and are in keeping with economic theory. The results of MAPE for goodness-of-fit show that the VAR model is between 0.1 and 0.2, and the ARIMA model is between 0.4 and 0.6. That is, the VAR model is better than the ARIMA model in forecasting changes in the price of metals.

• Ocean and Polar Research
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.199-205
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• 2004

$SiO_2$ and CaO are added to decrease the smelting temperature in the reduction-smelting method for manganese nodule processing. These elements are components of the manganese nodules and might be very important controlling factors in the processing due to the locally variable content. The 707 chemical data of manganese nodules acquired from 1994 to 2001 in KODOS(Korea Deep Ocean Survey) area were used for the hierarchical cluster analysis. The chemical data were classified by the morphological types, and the averages of the chemical data for each station were classified by the facies groups and the localities. All data are plotted on the $SiO_2-CaO-MnO$ phase diagram at $1773^{\circ}K$ to compare with the best compositional area in the nodule smelting. Variations and distributions of $SiO_2$ and CaO in KODOS nodules were also reviewed. The mineral phases assigned by the cluster analysis are CFA(Carbonate Fluorapatite), Fe-oxide, Al-silicate, and Mn-oxide. MnO contents are generally higher than $SiO_2$ contents in most of the morphological types except for the Is- and It-type. The Dt- and Tt-type show wider range and the E-types show high anomaly in their CaO contents. The stations which belong to facies group A and B show generally higher MnO contents than $SiO_2$ contents, however, the stations of facies group C and D show wide range in their MnO and $SiO_2$ contents. It seems to be very important to control the $SiO_2$ contents in the processing because of the wide range in the northern area. The additions of approximately 10 wt.% CaO and 10 wt.% $SiO_2$ are recommended for the northern area, whereas, the additions of approximately 10 wt.% CaO and 20 wt.% $SiO_2$ are recommended for the southern area.

• Journal of Ocean Engineering and Technology
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• v.25 no.6
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• pp.86-90
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• 2011

The mining of imitated manganese noodles in 1000 m of seawater is planned for 2012. Thus, it is necessary to prepare the lifting pipes to be used for the test. Because of storage and expense constraints, flexible and economic HDPE pipe is being considered, making it necessary to test the structural safety. Material, pressure-chamber tests and finite element analysis of HDPE pipe for the 1000-m depth were performed. The tangential stiffness of HDPE was obtained through tension and three-point bending material tests and used for a structural analysis. FEA results show that the current sample pipe segment is safe for 1000 m of water pressure, and the stress result is also within the safe value. From the current results, the HDPE pipe seems to be acceptable only for the currently suggested constraints. However, more numerical and pressure tests need to be considered by applying additional physical conditions such as gravitational and hydrodynamic loads, external and internal fluid pressure, axial force induced ship motion, and heavy pump pressure to determine future usage.

• Resources Recycling
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• v.21 no.5
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• pp.3-17
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• 2012

Selective leaching processes for copper, gold, nickel, and cobalt have been investigated because there is an advantage of ammoniacal hydrometallurgy that metal such as copper could be selectively extracted restricting the dissolution of iron or calcium. In the present article, the studies for selective ammoniacal leaching of copper from motor scraps and waste printed circuit boards (PCBs), for ammoniacal leaching of gold to decrease the amount of cyanide used or to substitute cyanide by thiosulfate, and for ammoniacal leaching to recover nickel and cobalt from nickel oxide ore and intermidiate obtained from manganese nodule treatment process were summarized and further studies were proposed for domestic technology development for ammoniacal hydrometallurgy processes.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.30 no.5
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• pp.493-498
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• 1997

The purpose of this study is to develop geostatistical model for evaluating the abundance of deep-sea manganese nodule. The abundance data used in this study were obtained from the KODOS (Korea Deep Ocean Study) area. The variation of nodule abundance was very high within short distance, while sampling methods was very limited. As the distribution of nodule abundance showed non-gaussian, indicator simulation method was used instead of conditional simulation method and/or ordinary kriging. The abundance data were encoded into a series of indicators with 6 cutoff values. They were used to estimate the conditional probability distribution function (cpdf) of the nodule abundance at any unsampled location. The standardized indicator variogram models were obtained according to variogram analysis. This SIS method had the advantage over other traditional techniques such as the turning bands method and ordinary kriging. The estimating values by indicator conditional simulation near high abundance area were more detailed than by ordinary kriging and indicator kriging. They also showed better spatial characteristics of distribution of nodule abundance.

• Ocean and Polar Research
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.367-371
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• 2014

In early 1990s, the Korean government has launched a deep-sea research program to secure the stable long-term supply of strategic metallic minerals including Cr, Cu and Ni. Through the pioneering surveys, Korea registered $150,000km^2$ of Mn-nodule field in the Clarion-Clipperton area, the NE equatorial Pacific to the international sea-bed authority (ISA) in 1994. Following the ISA exploration code, the final exclusive exploration area of $75,000km^2$ was assigned in 2002, based on results of eight-year researches of chemico-physical properties of nodules, bottom profiles and sediment properties. Since that time, environmental studies, mining technical developments including robot miner and lifting system and establishment of smelting systems were accompanied with the detailed geophysical studies to decipher the priori mining area until 2009. Major points of the recent Korea Mn-nodule program are deployed on a commercial scale until 2015. In order to meet the goals, we developed a 1/5 scaled robot miner compared to commercial one in 2012 and performed a mining test at the water depth of 1,370 m in 2013. In addition, detailed 25,000 scaled mining maps in the priori area, which can provide operation roots of the miner, will be prepared and an environmental-friendly mining strategy will be pursued based on the environmental impact test and environmental monitoring.

• Ocean and Polar Research
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.515-524
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• 2014

The Korea Institute of Ocean Science and Technology has acquired detailed biological, chemicophysical, and geological data in the northeastern Pacific through a manganese nodule program since 1983. Plenty of manganese nodules were collected to estimate the amount of resources by free-fall grab and box corer. The collected manganese nodules have been archived systematically in the rock and mineral storage section of the Library of Marine Samples (LIMS) since 2012. The LIMS provides essencial information on the stored samples including sample name, nodule type, sampling location, depth, and equipment. Although a high quality database of the information system is under construction, the samples have tagged information for manganese nodules like chemical composition, morphology, weight, size, abundance, and photograph. In this study, we attempted to provide information on the well-organized and easily accessible archived manganese nodule samples for future studies and to introduce the usefulness of the LIMS.

• Ocean and Polar Research
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.475-485
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• 2014

Seawater flow characteristics around a manganese nodule mining device in deep sea were analyzed through numerical investigation. The mining device influences the seawater flow field with complicated velocity distributions, and they are largely dependent on the seawater flow speed, device moving speed, and injection velocity from the collecting part. The flow velocity and turbulent kinetic energy distributions are compared at several positions from the device rear, side, and top, and it is possible to predict the distance from which the mining device affects the seawater flow field through the variation of turbulent kinetic energy. With the operation of the collecting device the turbulent kinetic energy remarkably increases, and it gradually decreases along the seawater flow direction. Turbulent kinetic energy behind the mining system increases with the seawater flow velocity. The transient behavior of nodule particles, which are not collected, is also predicted. This study will be helpful in creating an optimal design for a manganese nodule collecting device that can operate efficiently and which is eco-friendly.