AUSTRALIAN MINE SURVEYING CONVENTION 2010   

 

The Self Mapping Mine A future we can create    Author:  Damian Vella   August 2010  Synopsis: New positioning technology being applied in mining presents a unique opportunity for surveyors to sculpture its integration with the surveying function. The WLAN communication and database resources supporting Fleet dispatch and monitoring systems can become the foundation for automating GIS based mapping processes. Super-tools developed on GIS platforms can then be applied to support production planning and optimisation. BMA’s Goonyella-Riverside Mine has state-of-the-art Modular Mining fleet management infrastructure and an extensive machine guidance implementation on draglines, overburden drills and dozers. The majority of minescapes are formed and traversed by machines with guidance and positioning systems and in recent years regular and extensive application of airborne LiDar has been used to update mine mapping. A well implemented and stable ESRI GIS has been at the heart of mine mapping for fifteen years. The self mapping mine concept is a hinge pin in the surveying vision at Goonyella- Riverside Mine. This paper explores the self mapping mine concept, its origins and its practical implementation.

The Author: Damian Vella is a Registered Surveyor (Qld) with Mining O and Engineering Endorsements. He has 40 years of continuous surveying practice and is the Chief Surveyor at BMA’s Goonyella Riverside Mine where he manages the surveying & mapping service and the machine guidance & fleet management infrastructure. He is a champion in BMA for spatial technology and is the recipient of three BMA corporate Operational Excellence & Innovation Awards and one Business Improvement Award.

The Self Mapping Mine   

OVERVIEW The “Self Mapping Mine” is a concept that is gathering momentum with every implementation of new measurement and communication technology. The principal enablers are high precision positioning technologies on mining equipment and the use of relational data bases as the retention mechanism for productivity information from fleet management and machine guidance systems. These systems run in near-real-time and have an arsenal of data extraction and reporting tools to deliver business intelligence from the vast amounts of spatially tagged data. However, at this time, little use is being made of it to automate mapping processes. In mining, data usually has spatial attributes. In most cases, mapping grid coordinates acquired by survey measurements or by some GPS based monitoring/guidance method. Everything from the mining reserves to dragline swings paths and the location of excavator scoop loads is retained in SQL or Oracle data bases. In many situations positional data is streaming over high capacity communication systems in real time. The infrastructure established to manage & monitor mining fleets and automate machinery is the nervous system for a self-mapping mine. The data from machine based guidance systems coupled with the measurement from airborne LiDar; survey laser scans; and satellite EAR provide an immense volume of spatial data. The brain that provides the mapping intelligence for the “Self Mapping Mine” is the Geographic Information System (GIS) used to extract, filter & structure spatial information from otherwise disparate databases and to provide mapping, scenario analysis and reporting. This paper is more about ideas than describing working systems; however, many of the concepts and methods essential for a “Self-Mapping Mine” already exist. It is still early days and many of the necessary technologies and systems are only beginning to reach critical mass in our industry. I believe we surveyors have yet to develop the vision to direct and channel this unprecedented opportunity in applying surveying science to mining. Not only do we need this vision - we must also acquire new knowledge & skills and the courage to lead change.

THE GREAT “STEP-CHANGE” The frame of reference for my optimism concerning the potential mapping solutions available by tapping into the many and seeming disparate technologies arising in mining is my experience of technology through the course of my career. In the last 4 decades surveying has been reincarnated by generations of technologies applied to instrumentation and information management. The foundation for self-mapping mines has been in the making for most of this time. Buz Aldrin had stepped onto the moon just a few months prior to the AIM Convention Paper – August 2010   

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The Self Mapping Mine    outset of my surveying career and I believe the technical revolution was spawned when NASA abandoned the Apollo project a few years later. Practical know-how entered industry and academia as the retrenched NASA engineers and technicians were re-employed there. Hewlett Packard, the suppliers of the Apollo modules’ computers, introduced a new generation of desktop computer technology. The HP9830A desk-top computer, initially advertised in 1973, finally arrived in Australia around about 1975. With 12 digit precision; BASIC language interpreter; 28K of RAM and a cassette tape drive it was revolutionary but it was also incredibly expensive costing as much as a dozen Holden Kingwoods. I learned to program one from the manuals and then managed to create a gridding application for automating stockpile volume calculations. After Saturdays spent surveying numerous stockpiles by stadia and then keying in the raw observations; the computer would crunch through to Monday morning and provide answers good enough to report with. Plotting applications were also developed so that positions from computer plots could be traced directly onto the mine plans. That was better than driving a dozen Kingwoods! Before electronics, surveying tools had not changed noticeably since micro optic theodolites replaced the ones with verniers and steel bands replaced chains. Mine surveying was enabled by theodolites with inverted image telescopes, stadia, steel bands & spring balances, lots and lots of levelling, and an endless amount of drawing table work. Mine mapping was an arduous process of plotting, drafting, scaling, and using instruments of torture like plotting protractors, pantographs and planimeters. “Gen Y” surveyors might have to Google Wikipedia for those ones; searching “drafting instruments used while not breathing” would be a place to start. The process of manually recording observations; transferring them from field books onto calculation forms; laboriously computing coordinates and then scaling positions onto Mylar plans and annotating them with lettering guides was not an efficient one by today’s standards. There was no other way available. Computations were by means of logarithmic table books such as “Chambers’s Seven-figure Mathematical Tables” and the “Main’s Roads Trigonometric Tables”. The lucky or rich amongst us owned Curta mechanical calculators, technology in use since the late 1940’s; but rest had to rough it with slide rules.

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The Self Mapping Mine    In 1975 the arrival of the HP45 calculator finally broke the slavery of computations. At about this same time, affordable EDM instruments like the AGA12 and Wild DI3 arrived on the scene; however, on those hot days while toiling to bring control into pits, we fantasised about a black-box that could be wheel-barrowed on to station to achieve submetre 3D positioning. We thought, turn a few knobs, push the red button and presto! We had to wait 25 years for a practical RTK-GPS solution to arrive, but we were imagining it back in the mid 70’s. Even in the light of what happen to instrumentation in the 1980’s and then to information management in the 1990’s; what has built-up through the last decade in communications and spatial technologies is on an unprecedented scale. In 1990, only 20 years ago; technology was embryonic in comparison to now. There was a litany of things missing we now take for granted. There was no Internet; Email; USB, WiFi or Bluetooth. No digital cameras, RTK-GPS; reflectorless total stations and on-board CoGo software. We had command line operating systems; 20Mb Hard drives; 9600 bps serial comms;10000 point triangulations and pen plotters. It begs the question -”How would you get through a day’s work now with the tool we had in 1990?” I hazard to predict that the gap between 1990 and now will pale to insignificance in comparison to now and 2020. So-called “Moore’s Law” postulated by Gordon Moore in 1965, predicts a doubling of processing power approximately every 20 months because of the steadily increasing transistor densities on chips, increasing clock speeds, stacking concentrations, and other factors. It may take another fifteen years to achieve the processing power of the human brain on a chip. Perhaps they will need to use quantum processing technology to achieve the required 100 trillion instructions per second, but if past performance predicts future performance, it is certain to happen. Within this fifteen year time frame, anything that we can now imagine concerning how spatial technology might be applied in mining will likely be possible providing it is backed by industry. Within the working lives of most “Gen X” surveyors truly autonomous mining is likely to be up and working. For instance, consider the possibility of maintenance workshops fitted with robots to perform change-out tasks and fit tyres; or even one step further – service vehicles operating autonomously. Do you think that’s too far-fetched? I wonder how long would take to develop if the global mining industry really backed it. Robotics are widely used in manufacturing so why not in maintenance? We mine surveyors, the spatial professionals of our industry, have the unique opportunity to help form and sculpture the integration and use of spatial data generated by existing and new technology. I hope this paper is a step in that AIM Convention Paper – August 2010   

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The Self Mapping Mine    direction. Alternatively, we might struggle to survive in a world dominated by concoctions of positioning implementations dreamt up by electronics’ engineers without knowledge of surveying requirements and semi-GIS applications invented by productivity monitoring companies without a thought for mapping integration. This trend is already established. Surely a “Self Mapping Mine” has to be a surveying invention and the one we offer to the industry as the vision for integrating and leveraging spatial technology to optimise business outcomes.

WHAT IS HAPPENING? The cost of equipment and people is driving a technological step-change in our industry. Technology developed for military situations is being applied in mining. This started some time ago. The first dispatching algorithms, as we know them, were developed to support the Allied forces invasion of Europe in WW2. Fleet Management Systems: Mining equipment is becoming larger. As size and capacity replaces numbers, the overall equipment availability and utilisation is a major focus. To this end, “mission control” type production and maintenance monitoring systems are becoming more the rule rather than the exception. These systems are essentially a marriage between communications, GPS positioning, machine sensors and software applications; many also have embedded machine guidance capability.

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The Self Mapping Mine    The infrastructure established to support fleet management system (FMS) is extensive, and in many situations, system duplication has occurred to support different functions or equipment types. At this stage, the FMS/guidance scene is disparate except for the use of standard relational databases. For example, at Goonyella-Riverside Mine there are three equipment specific guidance systems provided by different suppliers. However, the situation is improving with a movement from propriety to generic technology and with some of the bigger suppliers addressing the short-falls and oversights that drove duplication in the first place. At this time, mine surveying systems are poorly integrated with this information resource. Autonomous Trucking Systems: Automation has been gaining momentum in the industry for several years. Costs associated with manning and keeping people safe in mining environments are the principal drivers. The mining industry is experiencing difficulties hiring and retaining enough qualified people to run machines for existing production, let alone any new expansion projects. Manning costs increase with the remoteness of mining locations where the people component is as high as 40% for trucking operations. Essentially automation is an enhanced fleet management and monitoring system. The infrastructure and basic technology is much the same – WLAN communications, high-precision positioning and mechanical sensing, but also includes an obstacle detection system. An IT solution is what makes autonomous navigation possible and at the heart of autonomous trucking is a sophisticated dispatching & monitoring application that can be described as pseudo-GIS running on real-time information streams. At this time, the only working autonomous trucking solution working in mining production is Komatsu-Modular’s “Front Runner”. There are only two installations in the world - at Codelco's Copper mines in Chile and at Rio Tinto's West Angela's mine site in the Pilbara, West Australia. The largest mining company, BHP Billiton, has no implementation of autonomous trucking at this time. CAT’s failure to deliver a working solution has delayed plans to introduce this technology at Olympic Dam Mine.

Mining Magazine – Komatsu media release.

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The Self Mapping Mine    References to “Front Runner” Autonomous Trucking: http://www.mmsi.com/Frontrunner.html http://video.mining.com/videos/1293c0/komatsu_autonomous_haulage_%28english_version%29.aspx http://www.miningmagazine.com/equipment/komatsu-frontrunner-trucks-running-in-australia

Scanning Laser Systems: LiDar data sets have redefined the aerial mapping of mining terrain and the continuing evolution of laser scanners into innovative and robust surveying instruments makes them front-line surveying tools throughout the industry. Scanning technology in well on the way to being integrated into machine guidance and automation systems. The Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh developed an automated excavator system based solely on two scanning lasers back in 1998. www.frc.ri.cmu.edu/~axs/doc/iros98.pdf (an excellent paper)

The CSIRO Exploration & Mining has also been researching automating solutions based on laser scanners for the last 10 years. In the near future scanning & modelling systems on major mining equipment will map operational areas to provide guidance against 3D design shells, automate swing cycles and calculate production rates. The terrain data will be available to mine mapping system in near-real time by way of WLAN telemetry infrastructure. At this point there is an information bottle neck unless the mapping systems have the capability to automatically integrate this information; an essential element for self-mapping mines. Ideally, the companies producing fleet management systems would build their applications on main stream GIS applications instead of their own reinventions of GIS. References to automation ARCAP Projects performed by CSIRO

C14043- Accurate Guidance and Measurement for Excavators using a Laser Scanner C10039- Automated Digital Terrain Mapping for Draglines C5003 - Dragline Automation Implementation C3007 - Dragline Automation

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The Self Mapping Mine    Advances in Communication Technology: The avalanche of new communications systems; devices and platforms makes this the burning edge of human endeavour. Though much of it is for military purposes; the civilian applications are still very exciting. Some of these being multi-media telephony (a personal preference GIS in every pocket); internet based mapping and satellite imagery (World GIS on every laptop);vehicle navigation devices (GIS on every dash board); new GPS constellations; broadband internet; 802.xx meshing networks; affordable UAV’s; and the developing high altitude communications platforms (HAP = Stratellites).

HAP technology currently being energised by the US homeland defence budget, holds future promises for the complex telemetry environments of large mine sites. These high altitude platform stations could provide the robust telemetry coverage required for remotely controlled mining operations. Applications of spatial technology and communications are well and truly married and some future opportunities in mining situations can be readily identified. For instance, cheap generic vehicle navigation devices and mobile telephony used to provide low cost mine site navigation and a vehicle tracking system. The tracks from key vehicles could be used to update the mine access mapping. At present, individual light vehicle installations of a proprietary tracking system cost in excess of $10,000. Hence, considerable savings might be made over the vehicle fleets used by mining companies. The missing link in this case is the GIS interfacing software to provide an efficient means of building and updating the navigation device mapping.

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The Self Mapping Mine   

WHAT MIGHT SUCCESS LOOK LIKE? Using all positions: I believe that a successful implementation of the SelfMapping Mine concept would have every source of positioning being tapped and used to update the mine mapping on a near real time basis. When data is from an automatic feed, some intelligence can be added to positions by inference from the source of the data or design area attributes. 

GPS traces from service vehicles and haul trucks driving on access and haul roads are used to update the road network. The FMS operators routinely assemble this route mapping for fleet control purposes and this is automatically available to the GIS used for mine mapping.

Current shift GPS positions available from Modular’s Dispatch application.



Spatial analysis of equipment monitoring mechanical health events to provide understanding, corrective action and timely response.



All sources of terrain measurement automatically update mine terrain grids. The information source or the machine type and design polygon could be used to evoke relevant interpolators and assign attributes and metadata. Grid based methods are very well supported in the major GIS suites but the situational rationale and algorithms used to filter and in-fill terrain grids is pivotal to a robust process.



Survey pickups by exception to fill-in gaps and for quality assurance. Deployment of mobile scanning solutions

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The Self Mapping Mine   

Illustration of terrain grids derived from various sources with GIS functionality providing  instantaneous topography     Material Tracking: The integration of the reserves resource model with realtime material movement available from the FMS data base should be another feature in a successful application.

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The Self Mapping Mine    

Resource campaigning tools to provide scenario analysis for grade blends and trucking optimisation



Resource exposure and recovery mapping using machine guidance GPS; machine based scanning systems and surveying.



Stockpile management tools for tracking quantity and quality from the reserve block to processing plant, and every location along the way.



End of shift performance from volumetric measurement

Whole of enterprise availability: every desk top.

Single point of truth spatial information on

WEB PORTAL

                                  

 

 

Schematic of Single “Point of Truth” Delivery



Web portal delivery of production data, mapping, imagery, live camera feeds and near real time reporting would be the preferred user interface



Information available by WLAN directly to vehicles and equipment in the field



Minimised exposure of technical and design personnel to operational environments



Enablement of geographically disparate design teams (Brisbane, Perth, Johannesburg)

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The Self Mapping Mine   

HOW MIGHT IT BE DONE? Over the last 10 years, Goonyella Riverside Mine has adopted many of the facilities that contribute to a self mapping mine. The following considerations are based on my learning from a long continuity of experience in this arena. Find a vision. Vision makes the future. It can be a simple statement - “A Self Mapping Mine”. This then influences the choice and structure of technologies and provides a framework for leveraging mapping processes from the runof-the–mill production and reporting work that consumes most of the day. For instance, the selecting of systems that use standard SQL databases rather than propriety databases. Inevitably solutions will evolve to augment or automate the mapping aspects of the surveying service and alleviate the surcharge of work this periodically creates. For instance, at GoonyellaRiverside the Statutory Working Plan updates are linked to the mining reconciliation process. Plan a surveying service in line with an overall vision. The “expected” will always happen if the surveyor has no plan for surveying at his mine and that will be what the planning engineer and production supervisor expects from surveying. The surveyor should have strategies for providing his mining operation with system level solutions and synergies that mitigate the requirement for unplanned and reactive surveying. For instance, a GIS based mapping system supporting environmental, land tenure, and civil asset management. The mapping of disturbance, rehabilitation status, resource reserves and depletion, infrastructure and assets, buried services, access, leases and tenures, area of responsibility delineation, and so on; all integrated on a single platform. A Geographic Information System that provides a single, reliable and up-to-date source of mapping truth for all clients. Be technically aware and cross-skill. Previously disparate technologies are either rapidly converging or becoming intertwined by applications. In many situations, surveying is now dependent on reliable radio telemetry. Hence, skill to terminate coaxial cables and use crimpers stands a mine surveyor in good stead; particularly if his mine site has machine guidance systems. A surveyor should be aware of what technology is available and being developed, not only for surveying applications, but in the IT and communications fields as well. For instance, a multi-camera video system installed in a processing plant to monitoring stockpile dozer work might potentially be used with new generation photogrammetric software to provide a measurement system.

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The Self Mapping Mine    Make management aware of the technology. The onus is on the surveyor to keep management aware of developments and opportunities in applications of spatial technology. Help them to appreciate and respect what you do and what you know. Mining professionals who elect to follow a management career path might not be technically inclined. Managers usually focus on things such as production & cost performance, planning scenarios, and safety compliance. Hence presenting the benefits of a technology in those terms, rather than as a surveying facility, has more chance of success. Prepare thorough budget submissions. Understand your company’s budgetary processes, especially capital project justification. Get help from someone who is good at doing it and learn from them. Even if the initial request is unsuccessful it still has to be dealt with by a process that will document the business case for mine management to assess. If you present a case to spend a million dollars on a fleet management system it will surely get their attention. After a few submissions it is likely they will become comfortable with the idea and approve it. Resource the project properly. Do not attempt to do it yourself. Project management is a serious skill so get help – lots of it. Ensure that the other stakeholders know what is happening. Involve them in the projects implementation and encourage ownership. The technology is the easy part and usually it works after some initial hassles; however, the people component for fleet system interfaces and guidance applications can take a number of years. The introduction of technology often needs a cultural change to be effected as a perquisite for acceptance. Keep the momentum going Don’t rest on your laurels when an implementation is in place. Regard it as the foundation for something better. Incremental gains can be made by using redundant capacity in existing facilities such as WLAN telemetry systems or by introducing software to provide business intelligence from the gigabytes of data being continually written into databases from equipment. Seek management buy-in Keep your immediate manager in the loop. He needs information to offer at his respective management team and inter-site meetings. It might as well be about the “great work” the surveyors are doing than something else. AIM Convention Paper – August 2010   

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The Self Mapping Mine    Ensure that management gets something that helps them in their role, all the better that they are stakeholders too. Perhaps what a SSE gets from a $300k aerial mapping budget is a nicely framed ortho-photo of the mine for his office or meeting room.

CONCLUDING Hopefully this paper has provided food for thought as to what a “The Self Mapping Mine” might be. As you consider this paper, please remember that concepts and ideas are not working solutions; however, there is no such thing as a solution without the idea. A “working” solution invariably means a lot of work. Time and effort has to be invested and usually more of it then we anticipate and the original idea might get so knocked about that it is hardly recognisable in the working solution. Still all must begin with a concept and the conversations that bring it to life. The mining industry has a tendency to prefer existing solutions rather than new ones and attempts to get more out of the “tried and true” either by pushing it harder or making it bigger. Even though a technology might be proven in another situation it is unusual for the mining industry to readily adopt it. This is exemplified by the industry-wide failure to follow through with the developments in automation made by institutes such as CSIRO Exploration & Mining in the last decade. Mining is a variable business with a management culture of low risk tolerance and a propensity to stick with the known. Effecting innovative change in mining can be a laborious and frustrating experience, but it is much worst to be excluded from the selection and implementation of spatial technologies that affect our profession. We mine surveyors have an unprecedented opportunity to be champions for spatially based solutions that will take our industry forwards into automation, real-time monitoring and self-mapping mines. The providers of these technologies could travel a far less tortuous path is they conferred with the surveying and mapping professionals in the industry before reinventing established surveying technologies or concocting GIS-like interfaces. I believe this lack of consultation to be the principal cause for the system and infrastructure duplication that industry must use in order to obtain the required functionality from fleet management and guidance applications. Technology suppliers who fail to provide fit-for-purpose integrated systems risk losing market share with new expansion and replacement cycles. I believe that the concept of a self-mapping mine provides a focus for system integration and for leveraging unrealised value both from existing and future surveying, guidance, fleet systems and automation technology.

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Authors: Presenter:

Damian Vella & David Watt Damian Vella

Australian Mine Surveying Convention

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

A future we can create

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

The Self-Mapping Mine

11 – 13 August 2010 Holiday Inn Surfers Paradise

The Author: Damian Vella is a Registered Surveyor (Qld) with Mining O and Engineering  Endorsements. He has 40 years of continuous surveying practice and is the Chief  Surveyor at BMA’s Goonyella Riverside Mine where he manages the surveying &  mapping service and the machine guidance & fleet management infrastructure.  He is  a champion in BMA for spatial technology and is the recipient of three BMA  corporate Operational Excellence & Innovation Awards and one Business  Improvement Award.  David Watt, GIS Technical Officer at GRM, has contributed to  the graphics in this presentation. Synopsis: New positioning technology being applied in mining presents a unique opportunity  for surveyors to sculpture its integration with the surveying function. The WLAN  communication and database resources supporting Fleet dispatch and monitoring  systems can become the foundation for automating GIS based mapping processes.   Super‐tools developed on GIS platforms can then be applied to support production  planning and optimisation. BMA’s Goonyella‐Riverside Mine has state‐of‐the‐art Modular Mining fleet  management infrastructure and an extensive machine guidance implementation on  draglines, overburden drills and dozers.  The majority of minescapes are formed and  traversed by machines with guidance and positioning systems and in recent years  regular and extensive application of airborne LiDar has been used to update mine  mapping.  A well implemented and stable ESRI GIS has been at the heart of mine  mapping for fifteen years.  The self mapping mine concept is a hinge pin in the  surveying vision at Goonyella‐ Riverside Mine.  This paper explores the self mapping  mine concept, its origins and its practical implementation. 

What is happening?

 Automation = positioning + guidance + comms + sensing + IT solutions

• Larger & Less equipment units drives efficiency  Utilisation and availability is optimised by using FMS technology  FMS = comms + positioning + dispatch + health monitoring + IT solutions

• Reinventions of surveying and GIS solutions by non-spatial professions • It seriously impacts our future • We need to get involved

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

• Cost and availability of people drives automation

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

• People & Equipment costs are going UP • Technology costs are going down • This trend will continue into the future

•The mining industry is experiencing difficulties hiring and retaining enough qualified  people to run machines for existing production, let alone any new expansion  projects. Manning costs increase with the remoteness of mining locations where the  people component is as high as 40% for trucking operations.  •Mining equipment is becoming larger. As size and capacity replaces numbers, the  overall equipment availability and utilisation is a major focus. To this end, “mission  control” type production and maintenance monitoring systems are becoming more  the rule.  These systems are essentially a marriage between communications, GPS  positioning, dispatch, machine sensors and software applications; many also have  embedded machine guidance capability.  •We might struggle to survive in a world dominated by concoctions of positioning  implementations dreamt up by electronics’ engineers without knowledge of  surveying requirements and semi‐GIS applications invented by productivity  monitoring companies without a thought for mapping integration. This trend is  already established.  •Surely a “Self Mapping Mine” has to be a surveying invention and the one we offer  to the industry as the vision for integrating and leveraging spatial technology to  optimise business outcomes. 

How it began

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

• Just 4 decades ago (1970)

The next few slides have been included to set a frame of reference for my opinions.  •Amazing the entire technical revolution to date has taken place during my career as  a surveyor and  I have had a privileged exposure to it.  •When I began, these were some of the tools that dominated our laborious and  some what boring working lives. •Logarithmic tables; slide rules; plotting protractors; scales; self‐reducing  tacheometers; inverted image theodolites. We did a lot of levelling and drawing table  work. •I used these tools when I did the examinations for my mine surveyors ticket in 1975.

The Step-Change

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

1976 1975

1983

Buz Aldrin had stepped onto the moon in 1969 just a few months prior to the outset  of my surveying career. This event was the beginning of the biggest “Step‐Change” our civilisation has ever  known – Surveying included. I believe the technical revolution was spawned when NASA abandoned the Apollo  project a few years later.   Practical know‐how entered industry and academia as the retrenched NASA  engineers and technicians were re‐employed there.  Hewlett Packard (supplies of the Apollo module’s computer) soon released the  9830A desktop computer and then the HP45 Trig function calculator.  These empowered surveyors to create their own data processing systems and broke  the drudgery of manual computations. These devices and the EDM instruments that arrived at the same time changed the  surveying world forever.  It is difficult to find words that adequately describe that experience.  Almost every development since has been built on those foundations.  Just 8 years later we were using the first generation Total Stations.

In 1990

• • • • • • •

No Internet No Email No USB, WiFi or bluetooth No digital cameras No RTK-GPS No reflectorless / robotic total stations No on-board CoGo software

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

Command line operating systems 20Mb Hard drives 9600 bps serial comms 10000 point triangulations Pen plotters

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

• • • • •

In 1990 – only 20 years ago – the technology was embryonic in comparison to now. There was a litany of things missing we now take for granted. (Slide point content) ”How would you get through a day’s work now with the tools we had in 1990?” I hazard to predict that the gap between 1990 and now will pale to insignificance in  comparison to now and 2020.

The next decade?

– On chip processing power doubles every 20 months – processing power of the human brain within 20 years

Perhaps

Autonomous haulage Autonomous mining UAV surveying systems Maintenance Robots Exploration Robots Remotely controlled operations HAP based comms systems …..and

Self-Mapping Mines

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

• What does this mean for mining?

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

• Moore’s Law

We have little control over most of these developments, but we do have an opportunity to bring the spatial elements together and create Self-Mapping Mines.

Moore’s Law – processing power doubles about every 20 months.  Perhaps 15 years to achieve the processing power of the human brain on a chip. (Slide points) I think the strongest advances will be made in the fields of communications and robotics.  These are the burning edges of human endeavour  • Developments are progressing to create “smart‐dust” communication systems • Significant in the world of Robotics is a new partnership between NASA and GM.  •The HAP technology being developed by the US homeland defence budget has clear  application to mining. •As does the advances made in autonomous aircraft We have little control over most of these developments, but we do have an  opportunity to bring the spatial elements together and create Self‐Mapping Mines.

Principles of the SMM Concept

• Single Point of Truth – everyone uses the same information • Global access to this spatial information using Web portals • A suite of applications optimise mining processes • Implemented and managed by surveyors

As slide points

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

• All relational data-bases containing spatial data linked in a GIS

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

• Every source of positioning being tapped and used to automatically update the mine mapping on a near real time basis

Pillars of “The Self Mapping Mine”

GIS (Geographic Information System) – Single platform for all spatial data – Analysis tools – Applications – Views – Transportability

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

•

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

All spatially referenced data from surveying, mapping and production sources

The graphic illustrates the underpinning  construction for a SSM. ‐ All spatially referenced data from many contributing sources (be it from surveying;  mapping or production systems) is referenced by unifying GIS.  ‐ GIS is the essential unifying pillar that creates the mapping. ‐ It provides intelligence to the data by means of  •

analysis tools; 

•

applications; 

•

views 

•

and it provides transportability of this information into a global  environment.

GIS

- Overview

MachinesGeology

Views

Survey ……

Vehicle Monitoring

GIS Updates & Transactions •

Geographic Information System – Uses any spatially enabled database – GIS links location to information

Analysis

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

FMS

Mission Critical Applications

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

A Complete System For Maintaining and Using Spatial Information

The GIS is a complete system for maintaining and using spatial information.  For the most part, these processes are automated to create the Self‐Mapping aspect. Standard relational databases are used extensively in the mining industry to manage  vast amount of spatially referenced data ‐ everything from the ore reserves to  individual bucket loads.    The GIS links locations to information to provide business intelligence by means of an  array of structured outputs. 

Pillars of “The Self Mapping Mine”

FMS (Fleet Management System) – Communications Infrastructure – Fleet monitoring – Machine Guidance – Positions of process – Real time data streams – Reliable IT resources – SQL Databases

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

•

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

All spatially referenced data from surveying, mapping and production sources

The other pillar for a Self‐Mapping Mine is the Fleet Management System.  In this definition, FMS entails all measured, monitored, and recorded production  systems and the communication and IT infrastructure used to do it. FMS – is the essential enabler for a Self Mapping Mine

FMS -

Functionality

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

Surfaces

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

XYZ of processes

The FMS is an integrated system with enhancements running in parallel.  Main – Time Usage;    Operator Data;    Data from original  equipment manufacturer’s equipment health interfaces;  and production data. Enhancements ‐ such facilities as Pit camera networks and machine guidance for  some equipment types (for instance Draglines.) The data the Self‐Mapping Mine draws upon is  •positions of production processes such as loading; haulage and dumping •surfaces generated by machine guidance systems

FMS - Fleet Dispatch

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

Fleet Dispatch Room - GRM

This is the Dispatch control room at GRM.  Operators support the production and  maintenance functions 24‐7. This type of installation is a practical facility (not something from star‐wars) and is  scaleable to the requirement.

FMS - Dispatch Haul Assignments

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

The purpose of Dispatch is to optimise fleet utilisation

This is a typical graphics based assignment screen from the fleet dispatch application. The focus of dispatch is fleet optimisation, however this is within the spatial context,  and ultimately provides the locations needed to map the mines operations.

Overview

IT

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

COMMS

FMS -

FMS can be viewed as having 2 principal layers. ‐

The communications layer 

‐

The IT and IM layer

 The dispatch control centre is essentially where human intelligence and  monitoring is injected into the system.  Ensures optimization of production operations for the best business outcome. 

FMS - Web enabled cameras in Pits

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

Every camera has user controls

Numerous web enabled  pit cameras provided video of the mines production  environments. These can be panned and zoomed by the user.  Substantially decrease exposure of design people to pit conditions and provide  current imagery for “mud‐map” type communications with operators.

Web enabled cameras on Machinery

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

There are web enabled video cameras positioned at various strategic locations on  every dragline; shovel; bin and stockpile. These are also controlled from any desktop or by the operators as required. 

Real-time Equipment locations & paths

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

The FMS captures the real‐time positions and travel paths of all mine equipment.  These are retained in a a standard SQL database along with the respective time‐ usage, material and payload information.

PORTAL TO FMS REPORTS & DATA

Authors Damian Vella & David Watt

Incident Investigation Mechanical analysis Performance coaching Mapping solutions

AIMS Convention 2010 – “The Self-Mapping Mine”

• • • •

•The FMS provides an arsenal of automatically generated reports and an array of  data mining tools using standard web browsers. • For instance, the GPS path data for any equipment over any time period can be  used for Incident investigation, mechanical event analysis, performance coaching,  and mapping. •Automated processing of this data by the GIS can provided near‐real time mapping  of the access to operations, machine locations and places causing machine stress

FMS – MACHINE GUIDANCE Draglines –

Shovels –

•

Excavators –

•

APS / Modular

Dozers –

•

Pegasys / Modular

APS

Drills –

Modular

70 RTK-GPS systems (