Mining‐Induced Pressure‐Relief Mechanism of Coal‐Rock Mass for Different Protective Layer Mining Modes

The protective layer mining method of the traditional deep coal seam in has been confronted with great challenges, and it is difficult for coal and gas to be extracted together. Taking the occurrence conditions of III1 mining area of Luling Coal Mine located at Huaibei, China, as engineering background, the influence law of the lithology on stress environment in front of the stope was analyzed by theoretical analysis and numerical simulations. The mining‐induced mechanical effect of coal‐rock mass was studied under different protective layer mining modes. The results showed that the peak value of the advanced abutment pressure decreased with the decrease of lithologic strength under the same mining conditions. For simulated geological conditions, the stress concentration coefficient of soft rock and coal seam protective layer mining modes was 1.9 and 1.7, respectively. Under the mining stress path of different protective layers, the ratio of axial stress increase and confining pressure unloading in secondary unloading phase were 2 : 1 and 1.5 : 1, respectively. The axial stress‐strain curves of different protective layer mining modes had similar trends, and they had a volume expansion at the end of unloading (failure stage). In addition, it revealed the pressure‐relief antireflection mechanism of the protective layer mining. Under the same confining pressure condition, the peak stress and peak strain increased with the increase of loading and unloading velocity ratio. The reduced value of the confining pressure increased, while the volume expansion decreased at failure. The results were applied to III1 mining area in soft rock protective layer mining, which created the mining way of traditional coal seam protective layer. Furthermore, the gas control technology of soft rock protective layer working face was put forward for deep coal seam with low permeability and high gas, enriching the pressure‐relief mining theory of protective layer.