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In July, a report from the 2019 Australian iron ore conference in Perth noted that the state's iron ore is a world leader in open pit mining ahs (automated transportation system).
Richard price, project manager of mtga (Australian mining technician group), has been involved in this technology field for many years, and witnessed the test of the first two automatic trucks in the Willowdale bauxite mine in Pinjarra, Alcoa, as early as 1994.
At this meeting, price's report described the operation of AHS in Pilbara area: the first commercial trial operation of the iron ore started in 2008 in Rio Tinto's West Angelas iron ore, and two manufacturers' equipment were used in Pilbara area - command for Hailing of caterpillar and frontrunner of Komatsu - Rio Tinto, BHP Billiton and FMG group Three mining giants are leading the way in the application of automated trucks.
FMG is the largest automated truck operator (and the largest in the world) in Pilbara, with 128 automated trucks at the end of June, according to the company's performance report. According to their own public data, Rio Tinto now has 96 and BHP Billiton has 50.
However, Komatsu has been in the field of commercial automation for a longer time. By November, the transportation volume had exceeded 20 billion tons, which surpassed that of caterpillar. Carter has been very successful in the world, deploying the AHS system in Canada's oil sands mine, British Columbia coal mine and vale iron mine.
One problem with this technology is that the truck will stop running when the communication is interrupted, because the truck communication needs to know the location, direction and speed between vehicles through this network. At present, manual intervention is needed to restart the truck, but it will waste time.
Moreover, price said that in the Pilbara area, the trucking stopped would cause serious problems of target detection errors. "In mines where AHS is used, these conditions are often referred to as' ODS' (object detection) problems," price said, adding that many drivers feel that they are mainly due to the undulation of the road surface, potholes, stones. Similarly, restarting an automated truck usually requires manual inspection.
Leading position
Despite communication and OD problems, Western Australia is still in the leading position of automation. There are about 370 automated trucks in the world, 75% of which are running in Pilbara. Why? Price focuses on five reasons:
——The cost of drivers is high. The average annual salary for mining truck drivers is usually over $100000 (US $68900).
——Easy to implement. "The Pilbara mine site is open and the technology can be tested in a dedicated area before implementation of the entire mine site," price said It is pointed out that the terrain here is also convenient for the installation of communication facilities.
——Mine scale and life. Price said that the critical point of the previous ahs cost efficiency analysis was the transportation volume of 12 million tons / year, i.e. the transportation capacity of 6-8 trucks. All mines in the area exceeded this value and the mine life was long.
——The current practice of the mine where AHS is deployed is the fly in and fly out mode, which directly delivers employees from their employment point to the site.
——Pilbara area technology and experience, each mine contact fleet management system and technology application time is very long.
"Western Australia doesn't have to have any special advantages," price said. "It's for these reasons that ahs will be implemented at Pilbara iron mine."
Advantage
Price cited mining companies to illustrate the advantages of automation.
Rio Tinto said last year: "in 2017, the average automated truck is estimated to run 700 hours more than the traditional truck, and the transportation cost per ton is about 15% lower."
In the same year, FMG said automated trucks increased productivity by 32%.
Of course, there are huge security advantages to using automated trucks.
Future road
Price believes that mining will become more and more automated. He said that in the future, mines may use automatic distribution of data files, and trucks can work without human participation.
Price pointed out that Komatsu's cab less truck at minexpo 2016 in Las Vegas is a development direction worthy of attention. "Maybe in 20 or 30 years' time, the cab of a heavy-duty off-road truck will no longer be standard, but will need to be selected at a high price," he said
"The future is an era of automation, and technology will be more advanced than it is now." Price said that due to Pilbara's leading edge in automation, the region's iron ore industry is expected to be the first to use these technologies.
