The so-called 'digital mine' is no longer a future prospect.
It is already well and truly a fixture of the Australian mining landscape, and operators large and small, from front-end mining companies to the service industries, are a vital cog in the extractive industries supply chain.
The mining and resources sectors have undergone more change in the past 10 years than in the past 100 years.
Terms such as real-time data capture, automation and autonomous vehicles, wearable technologies and digital-twinning are part of the mining and METS sector lexicon in the 21st century.
But as Australian mining races to be at the forefront of a global trend, there are concerns about not only workforce availability and skill sets, but the traditional approach to tertiary education that is not necessarily geared towards the requirements of modern mining needs and practices.
What is the 'digital mine'?
The evolution of the 'digital mine' in Australia has been led by the the well established mining companies, known as the majors — large multi-national companies that tend to work in the bulk-commodities sectors such as coal and iron ore.
Rio Tinto led the charge when it moved its iron ore rolling stock to an autonomous model, and BHP Billiton followed with driverless trucks on some of its mine sites.Trains that can be kilometres long are autonomously operated from a nerve centre in Perth, Western Australia, and driverless trains and trucks are now commonplace in the iron ore industry in the Pilbara in Western Australia's north-west.
Now the junior and mid-size miners and the companies that service them are operating or working towards the digital mine model.
A digital mine is a traditional mine that is using digital technologies, for example: autonomous trucks, trains, and drones to extract greater value from existing assets.
They work with the so-called internet of things that enables them to use advanced technologies such as real-time data capture with low cost sensors that feed information back to operators.
That information, known as big data, may also come from technologies such as 'wearables', is integrated in areas such as planning, control and decision making with the ultimate aim of extracting greater value at lower cost, while improving the health and safety of mine workers.
The rise of the robotic drone
Drones are increasingly being used across many industry sectors, but Israeli company Airobotics is the first to introduce fully autonomous drones to the Australian mining industry.
It has teamed up with South32 to trial the drone at the Worsley Alumina project in south-west Western Australia.
Joseph Urli is the director of flight operations in Australia, and said the drones aimed to remove the '3 Ds' from the jobs of the mine workforce — danger, and dull and dirty jobs.
"Instead of doing things like sending people out on surveys, or having them undertake a mission, the drone can do it all and it reduces the exposure of humans to risk," he said.
Airobotics is also working with aviation safety body CASA to use the trial to help develop regulations on the use of autonomous drones.
"Australia actually led the world in terms of regulating drones and issued its first set of regulations in 2002," Mr Urli said.
"Since then, however, other civil aviation authorities around world have caught up and in fact overtaken regulation in this space.
"There's a senate inquiry underway into safety of drones at moment, and we think that's a very positive move, it is very inclusive and seeking input across the board from people like airline pilots, air traffic controllers, and professional drone operators.
"We want to see the mavericks taken out of the equation, and the drone hobbyist sticking to their assigned, approved airfields."
Airobotics demonstrated its technology at Diggers and Dealers in 2016 and at the time no company in Australia was working with industrial level autonomous drones.
It now has three deployed across the nation.
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