From record-high gold prices to the stunning growth in renewables driving demand for minerals and the global transition to NetZero, the mining industry is in an era of intense reinvention and disruption.

Africa鈥檚 mining sector isn鈥檛 spared this volatility. The continent has more than half of the world鈥檚 reserves of platinum group metals and diamonds and nearly half of manganese and cobalt reserves, both critical elements in the batteries powering the global transition to cleaner energy.

Searching for greater productivity

In the current business environment, mining companies are under intense pressure to increase efficiencies, reduce costs and boost productivity.

Autonomous technologies have ushered in a broad range of economic benefits for the mining industry over the past decade. By leveraging automation to perform more hazardous tasks, mining companies have minimised worker exposure to dangerous conditions and bolstered overall safety standards within their operations.

The emergence of digital technologies such as machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) has introduced new gains in efficiency and productivity. One market estimate predicts that investment into AI by the mining sector will reach $7.264 billion by 2033, driven by a compound annual growth rate of 22.7%.

The ethics of AI in mining

While it鈥檚 undeniable that AI holds immense promise for the mining industry, the introduction of any new technology is typically accompanied by several ethical dilemmas.

In the mining context, fears around AI range from the displacement of human labour by automation to the increased surveillance compromising data privacy and encroachments on autonomous decision-making.

One of the biggest fears of AI鈥檚 impact in the mining sector relates to the potential of the technology to displace workers by automating their job roles and essentially making them redundant.

In the African context, job fears will remain, specifically considering the important historical role the sector plays in employment creation, especially in markets such as South Africa.

There are also concerns over explainability, that is, how AI decisions can be explained in a way that makes sense to human workers. For example, if AI is used in surveillance at mining sites to improve safety and security, questions may arise over how the algorithm determines which actions can be considered to be safety or security incidents.

While AI has the potential to improve efficiency and safety in mining, its deployment introduces new risks that must be carefully managed. Mining companies, technology developers, and regulatory authorities must collaborate to establish robust safety protocols, provide comprehensive training, and establish clear lines of accountability to mitigate the risks associated with AI use in mining operations.

Practical use cases

Despite the concerns, AI will unquestionably play a leading role in the mining sector鈥檚 success in the coming years. AI lends itself to a myriad of applications across the mining value chain, including:

1 Exploration

AI-driven prospecting mapping models are emerging that analyse geological, geochemical and geophysical data sets to pinpoint promising areas for mineral exploration. By amalgamating diverse data sources, these AI models can enhance the successful discovery of promising resource deposits.

2 Geotechnical monitoring

Geotechnical monitoring and analysis are crucial to ensure ground and infrastructure stability at mining operations. Here, AI can be integrated with sensor networks to detect early signs of instability or failure, while predictive models can forecast ground behaviour and assess potential hazards. AI can also be applied to create detailed simulations of rock masses that can help guide the design of tunnels, underground layouts, and slope stability.

3 Mine planning and optimisation

AI technologies enable dynamic, datadriven decision-making to optimise mine plans and production schedules. Mining operations can leverage AI to predict performance under various conditions, helping decision-makers identify optimal productivity strategies while minimising costs. Predictive maintenance systems can also optimise the performance of mining equipment, reducing downtime and improving overall operational efficiency.

4 Supply chain management

AI鈥檚 benefits extend beyond mining sites to improve supply chain management. Predictive inventory management leverages AI for a variety of tasks, including reducing inventory planning time, minimising costs, optimising repair schedules, and determining the optimal times for reorders. By using techniques such as time-series analysis and probabilistic modelling, mines can gain real-time visibility over their supply chain. This can help mining operations optimise their logistics operations, including transportation routes and distribution networks.

AI is a transformative force in the mining industry, introducing a broad range of innovative applications to solving complex challenges across various facets of modern mining operations. By embracing AI-driven innovation and collaboration, mining companies can pave the way for a more efficient, sustainable and responsible mining future.

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The global mining industry is in a state of flux as unprecedented demand for resources clash with ongoing global economic volatility and geopolitical tensions, creating both immense challenges and opportunities.

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Bloomberg reports that , accounting for a third of total assets under management globally. This is nearly double the $22.8-trillion in ESG assets under management in 2016.

Effective sustainability-led business transformation creates long-term value for organisations as well as the communities and environment in which they operate. And when sustainability is embraced, it drives innovation across the business, leading to benefits for employees, customers, communities and investors.

However, there isn’t really a template for sustainability that can be repeated across businesses and industries. Each business needs to find tailored approaches to sustainability that take into account its industry, customers, business model and geographical market.

And nowhere is this more apparent than in the energy sector.

Energy market shows complexity of sustainability

The latest data from the International Energy Agency shows the .

Amid growing demand for reliable energy from a global population that has swelled past the eight billion mark and severe energy constraints resulting from the conflict in Ukraine, many countries have had to rethink their energy mix.

At or near the top of priority lists is the transition to cleaner, more sustainable and less environmentally-damaging forms of power generation, mostly from renewable energy sources such as wind and solar.

Calls for a ‘just transition’ have grown over the past few years as devastating storms, widespread flooding and extreme temperatures bring home the distinct dangers of a warming climate.

The World Economic Forum reports that global energy investment reached $2.4-trillion in 2022, of which . However, most of that investment stemmed from more developed Western economies.

In emerging markets, investments into clean energy are more complex, partly due to the availability of natural resources, where fossil fuels such as coal are easy to mine and readily available.

To achieve sustainability goals in emerging markets while still driving growth and economic progress, organisations need to develop smart, tailored strategies. But it can be challenging to understand where to start.

Sustainability requires tailored strategies in emerging markets

Developed countries have already leveraged carbon-intensive forms of energy to build their industries and boost their economic growth.

A transition to cleaner energy is arguably much easier in developed economies than their emerging market peers, where many of the developmental gains enjoyed by Western economies are still to be realised.

Much of Africa is still in a process of industrialisation and urbanisation, a transition that developed economies have long since completed. To build industries, support economic development and accommodate a rapidly growing population, African countries need access to affordable, readily available forms of energy.

This means that fossil fuels will likely remain a core part of the energy mix across much of Africa, especially in industries such as manufacturing and mining, where wind and solar power simply can’t provide the baseload energy needed for production.

Take mining as an example. The mining industry has traditionally been among the leading consumers of energy. As energy capacity becomes increasingly constrained, especially in countries like South Africa, mining operations have had to reduce their reliance on the national grid and build their own stable power supply.

This has led to huge investment into solar energy as a means of keeping the lights on. The power generated through solar helps power mining fleets and support the running of the entire operation. Some mining companies have even invested in hydrogen-powered vehicles as a means of reducing reliance on the grid.

However, solar power cannot provide the power needed for energy intensive processes such as smelting. For these processes, mines and manufacturers still need to rely on less sustainable forms of power.

Plotting a viable course for sustainability

Understanding the need to balance sustainability with business viability, how can African organisations start their journey toward sustainability in a way that still drives successful business outcomes?

Firstly, sustainability does not mean sacrificing profits. In fact, companies that successfully integrate sustainability into their strategies can potentially unlock a broad range of benefits, including increased revenue, reduced material expenses, reduced utility and fuel expenses, greater employee productivity and talent retention, and reduced hiring expenses.

Secondly, companies that can effectively manage their ESG (Environmental, Societal and Governance) risks can see a boost to their reputation, improved management of tax costs, and greater scope for investment to unlock long-term value. Incorporating sustainability into the core business strategy therefore holds the potential to deliver immense benefits, and should be a top priority for business leaders.

Third, when developing a business case for sustainability, organisations need to take a three- to five-year approach, which provides enough time to allow for new initiatives to gain the traction needed to yield results. The business case should be developed in alignment with core elements of the company income statement to ensure each sustainability benefit is directly tied to a measurable business outcome.

Funding for sustainability initiatives should come from existing line items in operational budgets, similar to how aspects such as marketing, education, and communication are budgeted for. Savings achieved through reduced material and utility expenses or reduced hiring expenses can be allocated to fund further sustainability efforts, unlocking additional cost savings.

Finally, organisations should understand that remaining trapped in the inertia created by unsustainable business models will make it difficult to succeed as they lose loyalty, talent, customers and market share to their more sustainable peers. By proactively making sustainability a core part of their business strategy, African organisations can discover new sources of competitive advantage for all stakeholders.

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At the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic鈥檚 worldwide economic and social disruption around early April, analysis by GlobalData showed that more than 1,600 mines worldwide had been temporarily suspended. While companies have remained coy on the extent to which this has affected production, the larger picture is slowly being filled in: Fernando Alanis, the head of Camimex, Mexico鈥檚 mining chamber, 聽estimated that mining output in the country is likely to fall by around 17% in 2020; Coal India reported an 11.2% decline in production in May 2020 compared with May 2019, and Minerals Council South Africa CEO Roger Baxter said that mining output in the country is likely to fall by 8- 10% this year.

Concerns have been raised that mines could be potential hotbeds for new outbreaks of the disease due to the close proximity miners work in, with significant outbreaks among Polish coal miners in the mining region of Silesia showing that regular mining operations will be difficult to resume in a safe capacity.

Automation in the spotlight

Automation and remote mining are not new ideas 鈥� the first major foray into the technologies came with Rio Tinto鈥檚 Mine of the Future project back in 2008 鈥� but they are ideas that are likely to be accelerated in the mining industry鈥檚 post-pandemic future.

鈥淗ad these technologies been in place we may not have been required to close a mine as a result of the pandemic 鈥� as was the case with our South Deep mine in South Africa,鈥� said Gold Fields vice president of corporate affairs Sven Lunsche.

鈥淥perating machinery remotely is physical distancing at its most extreme, as it ensures that our people can operate machinery away from their colleagues and away from working areas where they are most at risk.鈥�

Resolute Mining, operators of the world鈥檚 first fully autonomous gold mine 鈥� Syama, in Mali 鈥� confirmed that operations at the mine had been unaffected, and production was still in line with expectations.

Gold Fields CEO Nick Holland, who has been an advocate of automated innovations in mining, says that: 鈥淚n terms of technology, the Covid-19 crisis will undoubtedly help to accelerate mechanisation, automation, and digitisation of the mining industry.鈥�

Holland acknowledged that new technologies will require new skill sets among the company鈥檚 workforce, but, 鈥渨here possible鈥�, Gold Fields will retrain its employees to work with the new technologies.

鈥淚n the long-term it will undoubtedly lead to lower staffing levels at most mines.鈥� Holland said.

Remote mining operations are perhaps most prominent in the Pilbara region of Australia, where companies including Rio Tinto and Fortescue Metals have implemented automated processes that are overseen at remote operations centres in Perth, around 1,200km away. Gold Fields has been in the process of implementing remote-control systems for its underground machinery across its Australian operations, operated at surface-level control centres.

51风流South Africa industry advisor Shabir Ahmed said that mining companies will be looking at a range of technologies in response to Covid-19, both in their corporate activities 鈥� attested to by the rise of Zoom, Slack, and other virtual collaboration tools 鈥� and at their operational sites, with particular attention being paid to control centres equipped with advanced digital and analytical capabilities. Ahmed went further: 鈥淎dvanced technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning may also form part of this powerful arsenal of digital technologies, aimed at enabling key decision makers to monitor, track, and respond to possible business disruptions in real time.鈥�

Analytics technologies can be a boost to efficiency in mines, essentially digitising and automating various safety processes that would typically need to be manually monitored on location.

鈥淒igitisation is also being implemented at our Australian mines,鈥� Lunsche said of Gold Fields鈥� moves towards remote mining. 鈥淲e use sensors and machinery to provide us with live data of the ore body we are mining. This, for example, allows us to place explosive charges in drill holes where they are most effective, rather than relying on the experience of a drill operator.鈥�

The benefits are not limited to pandemics

While the benefits of autonomous and remote mining technologies have perhaps never been more prescient than in 2020, when miners have been forced to sacrifice production output to curb the spread of a highly infectious disease, the benefits of these technologies are wide ranging.

鈥淎bove all, the benefits are safety related,鈥� Lunsche said. 鈥淎t underground mines, rock bursts are one of the main reasons for serious injuries and fatalities. Remote mining removes people from the rock face.鈥�

鈥淭here are clearly also productivity and thus cost benefits. Our ultimate goal is to be able to operate machinery continuously for 22 hours a day鈥� at the moment the hours are much less than that,鈥� Lunsche said.

Autonomous machinery can be programmed to complete certain processes, like driverless haul trucks moving material from one location to another. While activities such as these can be performed relatively safely by human operators, there always remains an element of human risk 鈥� a brief lapse in judgement could result in an accident. Machines are more predictable, and can repeat the same task identically. The predictability factor means hazards can be better identified and neutralised, but also means that the machines can operate with relatively little oversight.

Aside from the cost benefit, automation may also bring benefits to the workforce themselves.

Ahmed explained: 鈥淭here is also an improved work-life balance, improved diversity of hiring, for example the opportunity to hire people with disabilities or implement more family-oriented strategies. Mining companies may also be able to tap into a new resource pool of people who would be interested in working in the mining industry if it was environmentally cleaner.

Most mines are retrofitted to use automated technologies but as the equipment becomes more widespread, efficiencies may also be found in how mines are designed and built 鈥� much like the purpose-built autonomous mine at Syama. As Ahmed explains: 鈥淎utomation enables more efficient mine design and processes such as more efficient scheduling and traffic management of both people and machines.鈥�

Barriers to automation

Despite the benefits that autonomous and remote technologies can bring for mining companies, there remain barriers to implementation. The Pilbara region of Western Australia can be considered a focal point of innovation in the sector, but this is largely due to the high number of open-cut mines in the region, which are easier to deploy autonomous machinery or digital networks in.

For underground mines, difficulties around signal strength 鈥� and therefore connectivity 鈥� at depth can make autonomous systems impractical to implement. While Syama is an underground operation, a fibre-optic network was deployed through the mine, ensuring that all autonomous systems have constant contact with the control centres on the surface.

Gold Fields has been trialling a tele-remote loading project with automation specialist RCT. While the company is exploring potential avenues to expand its remote technologies, Luncshe acknowledges this isn鈥檛 universally practicable: 鈥淭he challenges with remote loading centres are around interactions with other equipment and, most importantly, people. When operating the tele-remote machine the whole area has to be barricaded, isolated, and protected by laser barriers, which, if breached, force the machine to stop automatically. This will limit the application to areas which we can isolate.鈥�

Because of the unique properties of individual mines, there is no one-size-fits-all solution, and automation providers such as RCT, Epiroc, or Sandvik work with mining companies to tailor systems.

鈥淢anagement teams must realise that tech-enabled transformation is a journey unique to every company and mine, not a one-off application of use cases,鈥� Ahmed said. 鈥淭here are no silver bullets, and no one list of technologies that every company should implement. There will be hundreds, and ultimately thousands, of ideas, improvements, and use cases. A company should start by identifying a use case that will provide a high return on investment.鈥�

Lunsche is optimistic about the future of autonomous systems in the mining industry, however: 鈥淚ntroducing new ways of working is normally gradual not overnight. At the moment, economies of scale still favour traditional mines but we are starting to see the time when autonomous mining will be an inevitable course of action for most miners. It鈥檚 difficult to pinpoint the exact time but we are looking at years not decades.鈥�

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The post Could COVID-19 Spark an Autonomous Revolution in Mining? appeared first on 51风流Africa News Center.

Mining companies have been affected by COVID-19 outbreaks, and global restrictions to encourage social distancing have meant that mining projects have either slowed or been put on hold until further notice. There is no doubt that mining executives are beginning to feel nervous as the spread of the virus accelerates.

Share-prices of listed mining companies are in a downward spiral. Commodity prices across the industry have been tumbling as the industry considers the devastating aftershocks of this 鈥淏lack Swan鈥� event. To single out one example: platinum and palladium prices have dropped by more than 40% in just three weeks.

Mining companies are feeling the pressure, despite recent positive results brought by surging commodity prices and various cost-cutting initiatives. South African miner Sibanye-Stillwater鈥檚 share price has lost over 60% in the past four weeks while Impala Platinum has lost a similar percentage, and Anglo American is down by as much as 40%.

Covid-19 shakes mining sector

The response to the pandemic from governments and markets has shaken the mining industry. Restrictions imposed on mining companies has seen production shut down across multiple markets. Alta Zinc has shut-down production聽at its largest project in northern Italy. In Mongolia, Rio Tinto聽suspended non-essential operations聽following the country鈥檚 first confirmed COVID-19 diagnosis. And Anglo American is in the process of demobilising most of the 10,000-strong construction workforce at its copper project in Peru.

We鈥檙e also witnessing a halt on capex growth. While capital expenditure for the world鈥檚 20 largest mining companies grew by 12% in 2019 to reach $49.1-billion, we鈥檙e now seeing delays in project work and investments being put on hold.

The recent announcement of a 15-day quarantine in Peru, the world鈥檚 second-largest copper producer, has meant miners such as Anglo American, Pan American Silver and Newmont, have had to put a halt to operations, which includes the slowing of work on Anglo American鈥檚 major copper project.

South Africa鈥檚 21-day period of national lockdown has similarly ground all local mining operations to a halt until at least April 16^th. Even where shutdowns are not occurring, restrictions on the movement of people and supplies will inevitably delay development work.

Mining industry 鈥榤ore exposed鈥� to pandemic

South Africa鈥檚 mining sector is particularly exposed to the spread of Covid-19. According to the Minerals Council of South Africa, the industry employs a workforce numbering almost 420,000, many of whom are underground on any given day. Some mines have thousands of men and women underground, descending into the depths in crowded 鈥渃ages鈥�. Before and after, dressing rooms are filled with miners preparing for their shifts or cleaning up afterwards. It does not take an epidemiologist to realise that the mining work environment is a catalyst for spreading the COVID-19 pandemic.

In South Africa, this is exacerbated by the fact that the mining labour force remains migrant, with constant movement between the gold fields and platinum belt and Lesotho, Mozambique and the Eastern Cape.聽In addition, the average age in the industry鈥檚 workforce is over 40, increasing their vulnerability to an illness that poses a greater risk the older the infected person is.

On a slightly positive note, the South African mining industry鈥檚 experience with AIDS and tuberculosis should stand it in good stead: It has invested in health infrastructure and has experience with contact-tracing because the procedure with a tuberculosis diagnosis is similar to that of coronavirus.

The Minerals Council of South Africa has also published a 10-Point Action Plan for COVID-19 which outlines several measures to deal with COVID-19, however it will take its lead from agencies like the World Health Organization and the National Institute for Communicable Diseases.

Industry to fast-track automation?

The COVID-19 outbreak has made the immediate future of several mining operations around the world uncertain. As a result, there may be an increased appeal and demand for solutions to reduce the human workforce at mine sites.

The uptake of automated mine solutions including self-driving haul trucks and remote operations centers has been slow but steady. One of the earliest moves into automation came with global mining giant Rio Tinto鈥檚 Mine of the Future initiative in 2008. From a remote operations center in Perth, Western Australia, workers operate autonomous mining vehicles at mines more than 1,200km away in the Pilbara region of Western Australia. Today, around a third of the haul truck fleet at Rio Tinto鈥檚 Pilbara mines are autonomous.

The Syama underground gold mine in Mali, became the world鈥檚 first fully autonomous mine operation. Designed in partnership with Swedish engineering company Sandvik, the mine operates with fully automated trucks, loaders and drills. The fully autonomous operation means that the mine can operate 24 hours a day, with all operations overseen from a remote operation centre.

Depending on how long this crisis lasts, the mining industry could see big moves into autonomous mining technologies in the not-too-distant future.

Whilst it is not possible to predict how COVID-19 will further disrupt the mining industry, what is certain is that the mining industry must reconfigure and prepare itself to operate under a new normal, one in which it can operate and sustain itself under the new constraints and challenges that such pandemics bring with them.

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