go to waste in some operations stockpiling may not be used and the material either goes to processing or to waste initially in the early years of the life of mine the waste will go to the external waste dumps 1 to 5 because space has not been cleared in the pits 10 and 12 for in pit waste dumping however as more material is extracted from the mine the refill boundaries 21 will define open spaces into which waste material can be dumped typically the cost associated with moving waste material from its extraction point in the mine to one of the external waste dumps and then to an end pit waste dump or directly to an end pit waste dump is determined by the path the waste will follow in order to be moved from its place of extraction to the external waste dump or the in pit waste dump this path is defined by the node 16 and therefore by virtue of the number of nodes 16 which are crossed a cost of waste movement can be determined each of the nodes 16 on the road network 14 are defined by a node number a road number and a location number on that road the same node number can be associated with multiple roads this would indicate an intersection of two roads at that point the locations along any one road.