Electricity + Control January 2019

CONTROL SYSTEMS + AUTOMATION

Embracing automation in mining

There is a growing move towards the automation of underground mining operations. This is the view of Simon Andrews, Vice President – Sales of Sandvik Mining and Rock Technology Southern Africa and also MD of the Sandvik South African Group of Companies. He says the mining industry is ever more receptive to the concept of automation and believes that a ‘tipping point’ in market acceptance is likely to be fast approaching.

Take Note!

Streams of real time data can be analysed to detect trends. Automation presents the opportunity for mines to employ a more diverse workforce.

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A utomation is part of a broader trend to- wards the ‘digitalisation’ of mining. “Within Sandvik, we see digitalisation as a means of leveraging digital technologies to drive efficien- cy and profitability,” says Andrews. “Most of our machines are now equipped to generate streams of data in real time which can then be analysed to detect trends, improve performance and enhance maintenance. But digitalisation also encompasses the full or partial automation of mining operations, also known as autonomous or semi-autonomous mining, and this is ultimately where the biggest gains are likely to be made. “We’ve noticed an incredible interest in our dig- italisation and, in particular, our automation tech- nologies over the past year,” Andrews continues. “Increasingly, customers are seeing automation as being business critical. With deeper mines, nar- rower deposits and generally more difficult mining conditions, costs are steadily going up. The only way that much of the mining industry is going to

survive is by increasing its efficiency through auto- mation and other technologies.” Andrews attributes the change in attitude in part to the emergence of a new generation of mining engineers and managers, who have been brought up with smart phones and the Internet and who are entirely comfortable with new technology. Full-blown autonomous mining installations around the world are still relatively rare but they do exist and have generally proved successful. An ex- ample in South Africa is the Finsch diamond mine in the Northern Cape, where a fully automated trucking loop has been operating for well over 10 years. Sandvik was the supplier of the technology, which included a fleet of six ‘driverless’ trucks. “One of the reasons there has not been a big- ger uptake of automated mining technology thus far in Africa – and indeed worldwide – is that there has been a dearth of new mining projects over the past several years,” says Andrews. “The tech- nology is best applied in greenfield projects. The

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JANUARY 2019