Welcome back Esh.
Here is some interesting info on automation.
Automation in the rest of Africa
In addition to the full automation of the Syama underground mine in Mali, further afield in the Democratic Republic of Congo at the Kibali mine, gold major Randgold Resources is operating three Sandvik loaders fitted with the Sandvik’s AutoMine automated mining system and the OptiMine modular information management solution that offers a real-time view of underground mining operations to provide real-time tracking and production management tools and analytics outputs for overall equipment efficiency improvements.
Moreover, in Zambia, Chinese mining firm Nonferrous China Africa is installing automated systems to commence with underground mining at its South East Ore Body project.
These include the AutoMine Truck Hauling, AutoMine Lite, OptiMine systems and Sandvik automated development drilling technology (DD422i).
“It is clear that automation is not only reserved for first world mining countries, as this is already taking place in Africa,” Engström enthuses, noting that Sandvik has three dedicated sales area vice presidents for Africa – in the Southern Africa, Western Africa and Central Africa regions – to proliferate the uptake of autonomous mining solutions, which are aimed at ensuring mines run more productively and they also remove workers from the highrisk exposure zones.
Iterating Sandvik’s thoughts on automating mines in Africa, Welborn explains that while automation is ultimately viewed as the sudden replacement of human beings by machines and robotics, automation in bulk mines in Western Australia for example, is being used to replace high cost labour.
In underground mining in Africa, however, it is about efficiency and safety and provides a workforce benefit in that it allows local Malians to be trained to operate world-class equipment in the world’s first fully automated underground gold mines as opposed to making use of expensive expatriates.
Forefront leader in automation
In response to the growing need to improve employee safety while simultaneously compensating for increasingly difficult-to mine ore bodies and lower grades, Sandvik is focusing intensively on its wide array of automation solutions.
Sandvik was first off the mark with its automated underground self-driving loaders which are operated autonomously from surface and has since built a strong position in autonomous equipment and automation which it plans to maintain going forward.
“Having emerged from the downturn where mining companies predominantly focus their energy on improving cash flows and reducing operating costs, the next significant means to take a quantum leap up the performance curve is to go the route of automation, digitisation and autonomous mining,” Engström explains.
“Having initially automated our underground drilling equipment as far back as 20 years ago, we will have close to 400 machines operating in autonomous operations by the end of 2018 – with over 2 million LTIF operating hours in underground mining operations around the globe.
While there certainly is a strong draw card for the implementation of automated mining equipment in future as an enabler for safety, productivity and lower costs, Engström believes there is a need to keep the more direct hydraulic assortment of equipment because some companies in some of the more remote parts of the world are not ready to make the switch owing to the need for equipment support and maintenance of a technologically advanced machine,” he explains.
“While we are confident that the iSeries will grow and become the more prominent range of products in our stable, we do still see value in keeping both offerings for our clients,” Engström adds.
Expand
(20min delay)
