Much low-level thermal energy and water vapor are stored in the hot and humid airflow of mines, which results in a poor underground working environment, proposing threats to workers’ safety and health. The direct discharge of exhausted ventilation air causes a waste of resources as well as pollution problems to the surrounding environment. Therefore, the extraction and utilization of mine ventilation heat and humidity have become an important way to solve the thermal damage problems in deep mines and promote a low-carbon transformation for their development. Since the heat and humid parameters of mine airflow change with time, the real-time determination of them is critical to the thermal and moisture recovery from mine ventilation air. In this study, the distribution and variation of heat temperature and humidity for key mine joints were determined based on the real-time calculation of the heat and moisture content for the air network. The calculation model of condensation heat and humidity extraction was established. The technology of low-level heat extraction ventilation airflow was also developed. These two together formed a refrigeration, dehumidification, and resource in-situ utilization system. Furthermore, the thermal and humidity extraction and utilization methods were put forward for the centralized and the distributed sources from mine ventilation. The effects of heat extraction and water recovery were analyzed with examples. The results show that around 224 t/day of moisture and thousands of kilowatts of thermal energy were wasted with direct ventilation air emission, the recovery and utilization of which could benefit economically. The approximately linear relationship was revealed between the temperature decrease and the theoretical moisture recovery from ventilation air emission, which provides a rapid way for engineering estimation. The work of this study provides constructive ideas and a theoretical basis for the extraction and utilization of low-level thermal energy and the heat damage control in mines.

mine ventilation,hot and humid airflow,wind network calculation,low-level thermal energy extraction,condensation waste heat utilization