Suncor Ore Preparation Plant Suncor Ore Preparation Plant Suncor Ore Preparation Plant

Suncor Ore Preparation Plant

Fort McMurray, Alberta

Kiewit completed this $9.7 million project for the mechanical portion of Suncor’s Steepbank Ore Preparation Plant in July 1998. The ore preparation plant performs three processes — tar sands ore is crushed into 50-milimeter pieces; the crushed ore is screened; and screened ore is mixed with hot water in four large drums. Finally, the ore is transported via slurry pipeline across the Athabasca River to the extraction plant.

This seven-month project involved installing four 15-metre by 6-metre ore conditioning breaker drums, in addition to 15 1,400-hp hydro-transport pumps, motors, drives and support equipment. The piping work consisted of installing 13,000 feet of 2- to 30-inch diameter large bore steel pipe and 7,000 feet of small bore pipe.