Romanksi said he hoped to put the idea to mine managers at the GAG seminar later this month.

The GAG jet engine technology makes the underground mine atmosphere inert by eliminating oxygen through a release of carbon dioxide and water vapor into the mine. Up to this point the technology has been used to fight mine fires and create inert mine atmospheres in Australia since 1999. However Romanski has proposed a more proactive use for the jet engine.

Using GAG to inert the goaf during a longwall changeover has never before been tried anywhere in the world, he said.

The advantages of the system is the whole operation is done from the safety of the surface, where the unit is coupled to a borehole and in a short time the goaf can be inertised.

“We can inertise the goaf with no danger because the product is not explosive, and we can do large volumes very quickly. It takes seven hours to fill up 400,000 cubic metres,” he said.

Currently some gassy mines use the seam gas to fill the goaf. When utilizing the methane for this purpose the levels have to be bought into the explosive range putting the mine at risk. When this process is being carried out all personnel have to be withdrawn from the mine, causing downtime.

“Using the GAG system means we would inertise from a safe location, people could remain underground carrying out their duties because there is no risk of an explosion. Sometimes during a changeover a mine experiences downtime of three to four days, we could eliminate this sort of downtime,” he said.

Romanski said the mine would only have to pay the minimal cost of petrol for the service, as they already support QMRS through fees.