Impact Of Alternative Technology Equipment Within The SA Mining Industry

With carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere at their highest levels, Barloworld Equipment is well aware of the monumental changes needed to reach carbon neutrality. Elia Nandjiwa, executive head for Resource Industries/Mining, Southern Africa at Barloworld Equipment, says: “Becoming more environmentally friendly matters to everyone. We know the ozone layer is getting smaller, we are increasingly seeing the impact of climate change on a global scale, and we want a healthier environment to live in and a sustainable future.”

Hydrogen technology

Hydrogen technology is now reaping the benefits of unprecedented political and business momentum, with many strategies, policies, and hydrogen projects worldwide expanding swiftly. In the mining sector, hydrogen is forming part of many mines’ decarbonisation pathways, either as carbon-free fuel to displace diesel in heavy equipment – such as haul trucks and trains – or to generate electricity to power processing plants, with testing already under way and the potential for it to be used more widely before the end of the decade.

Earlier this year, Anglo American launched a prototype of the world’s largest hydrogen-powered mine haul truck. The truck was designed to operate in everyday mining conditions at its PGM mine in Mogalakwena, Limpopo.

The 2MW hydrogen-battery hybrid truck, generating more power than its diesel predecessor and capable of carrying a 290-ton payload, is part of Anglo American’s nuGen Zero Emission haulage Solution (ZEHS).

Anglo American says that nuGen provides a fully-integrated green hydrogen system, consisting of a production, fuelling and haulage system, with green hydrogen to be produced at the mine site.

Monitoring and optimisation

While traditional methods of monitoring are well established in the mining industry, these methods are not necessarily suited for the new world of business imperatives.

IMS Engineering’s I-Most (Integrated Monitoring Optimization Support Technologies) aims to tailor to this new world with:

• Increased plant availability
• Reduced environmental impact
• Lower operating costs
• Reduced labour resources
• Increased “green” credentials

I-Most can provide data insights into something as small as a single piece of mining equipment, or as vast as an entire process plant. This allows management and operational teams to make data-driven decisions to improve their operation, whether from a performance or environmental perspective. Additionally, a rules engine allows the operations team to monitor adherence to procedures.

Speaking about I-Most, IMS Engineering CEO Paul Brancher states: “A lot of what we are trying to do from an additional transformation point of view, is to take the data gathered from multiple sensors in and around a plant, and then clean this data properly and interpret it. At present, I think most plants are in the mining industry, and without the process we undertake, these plants will have lots of data, but not nearly the amount of analysis that should happen.

“Most often, we find that the biggest problem is that the granularity of the data is not correct. When you look at this data, there are no trends that you can pick out, based on the daily data. As you start to move through the trends and you start looking more, weekly trends start to emerge, and then suddenly we get to the monthly granularity, and we start to see what is happening between the feed, the product, and the waste,” he continues.

The system currently integrates directly onto any control system and maps any available parameters, through secure protocols, to a centralised database in the cloud. A single piece of hardware with minimal space requirements is required.

One of I-Most’s applications on communition equipment is able to monitor the following condition example aspects:

• Gap calibration monitoring
• Hydraulic system health
• Crusher heat generation
• Crusher efficiency zones
• Power curve area
• Wear factor
• Out-of-threshold alarms
• Real-time raw data visualisations
• Machine learning breakdown predictions

Autonomous ADT platform

A focus on improving ease of operation to provide more efficient and safer articulated dump trucks (ADTs) has consistently kept Bell Equipment at the forefront of innovation. The global ADT specialist is now achieving success with autonomous vehicle operation, where its forward-thinking approach enables interoperability between different control systems and the trucks it produces.

An autonomous operation has three elements:

• Machines that can be operated remotely.
• External sensors that become the eyes and ears of the machine.
• Sophisticated site control software manages operations based on communication with the other two elements.

According to Bell Equipment ADT product marketing manager Brad Castle: “Providing autonomous-ready machines will be a part of our core business in the future, but in terms of sensing and guidance systems, it makes sense to partner with market leaders and innovators, as we do with drive-train, hydraulics and electronics technologies in our trucks.”

Adding to the flexibility, Bell provides a standard cab with no extra hardware taking up space, to create an environment where manual, remote or autonomous operation is interchangeable.

“This would be useful for mining contractors, for example. Once their ADTs have finished a contract on an autonomous site, the sensory and control system could easily be removed and the truck either fitted with a new system for another site or be used in a manual operation,” Castle notes.

A mix of different drive technologies will establish itself in the market in the coming years. This includes the fuel cell as an essential building block. For alternative technologies of the future to gain momentum, it is now up to politicians, manufacturers, and service providers to pull together, optimise framework and production conditions and promote digitalisation and automation.