Development of a New Gob-Side Entry-Retaining Approach and Its Application

Gob-side entry retaining plays an important role in the sustainable exploitation of coal resources and has been widely used in coal mining. However; some disadvantages, such as high labour intensity and low efficiency of wall construction, have gravely restricted the application of this technique. To solve this issue, this paper developed a new gob-side entry retaining approach including a lightweight and high-strength foam concrete and a mortise-and-tenon structure hollow-block wall. The experiment results show that the preparation of foam concrete with a density of 1200 kg/m 3 ; with uniaxial compressive strength greater than 15 MPa, can be realized by the chemical-foaming method. The method is performed by adding silica fume, slag and fly ash to a system of “cement and sand” structure collocation and by optimizing the proportioning of the materials. The density of foam concrete is reduced by 50% relative to that of common concrete which can greatly reduce the weight of the blocks. Compared with the conventional gob-side entry-retaining wall the new wall structure has many advantages. For example, it can improve stability by increasing the width-to-height ratio of the wall and save 44.44% of the material, and at the same time; it can save manpower and improve labour efficiency. Finally, the new approach was tested in the 3203 gob-side entry-retaining working face in a Chinese coal mine and the application effect proves that the new approach is well suited for entry retaining. The wall structure and parameters are reasonable. This work can contribute to the sustainable and efficient exploitation of underground coal resources.