Classification of Coal Resources Using Drill Hole Spacing Analysis (DHSA)

The classification of coal resources generally is based on geometric factors and the complexity of geological structures. The classification has not considered coal quality factors such as ash content, sulphur content, caloric value. The development of international classification standards has required a geostatistical analysis for the estimation and classification of coal resources. The purpose of this research is to apply geostatistics method to determine optimal drill hole distance, and to analyze classification of coal resource based on data of coal quality and quantity. Based on global estimation variance (GEV) approach from geostatistics, relative error value was obtained. Drill hole spacing analysis (DHSA) results in optimal drill hole spacing on each coal seam for the coal resources classification. Estimation using kriging block results in the value of kriging relative error. Coal resources classification was based on relative error of 0-10% for measured resources, 10-20% for indicated resources and > 20% for inferred resources. Based on a case study in a coal field consisting of three coal seams, the geostatistical approach produced the smallest distance on seam-3 as the optimal borehole range in the research area. This classification yields a greater area of influence than the SNI standard on simple geological complexity.