NETWORKS & CONNECTIVITY
reseller/integrator community to provide some installation and postinstallation
support.
Moccia adds: "Another big unique aspect of Redline is our scalability
offering to mining, being able to provide solutions from juniors right up to top
tier companies. Our EPC licensing starts at just 25 users compared to the
100,000 users minimum from some the global telecomms companies. Our
EPC is also completely hardware agnostic and is based on user demand. So,
you can connect 25 users on a private LTE network. For larger LTE networks
with 25,000, 50,000 or more users, we can centralise it on a CPU or
decentralise across multiple CPUs based on what the customer wants. It can
be hosted onsite or in the Cloud. Our solutions are also cost effectively
designed for scale, designed for the industrial not the carrier sector."
Looking at its mining private LTE market, Redline now has six major
installations, for now all in North America, three underground and three
surface. Several of them are also running autonomous equipment pilots.
Above ground it is through collaborations as it isn't a mobile network
operator with access to spectrum so for these projects it works with spectrum
holders. Underground it is a different story as in North America you don’t
need to work with the regulators for spectrum; you can choose to use
whatever spectrum suits your needs.
Moccia comments: "The driver for existing mines wanting private LTE is the
limitation of their existing WiFi networks including mesh but the LTE is more
of a complementary expansion rather than a replacement. For many
applications WiFi remains more than enough, but for mobility, autonomy and
density requirements, but for real time connectivity, push to talk comms etc,
LTE works much better. But WiFi and LTE coexist."
One of the surface projects is with Baffinland, the Canadian iron ore mining
company that operates the Mary River mining operation in the northern part
of Baffin Island, well above the Arctic Circle. They are a long term customer -
several years ago Redline started working with them as the mine was being
challenged with propagation of RF signals and their high latency solution was
unable to support real-time control and monitoring especially for the
conveyor belt which ran between the mobile ship loader systems and the
feeder subsystems. After using other digital broadband wireless systems,
they deployed a Redline virtual fibre solution with the ability to deliver high
quality point-to-multipoint (PMP) communication systems. This has now
evolved into them installing a Redline full private LTE network which they are
using for some autonomy trials. Elsewhere, Redline has also installed other
private LTE networks at surface mines in Utah and one in Nevada.
Also in Canada, Redline is working with a number of underground mining
entities on rolling out private LTE networks. Redline is confident that its
technologies' simplicity is a significant differentiator – it doesn’t have the
complexity that comes with a carrier architecture to the point where workers
that have operated LAN and WiFi systems can be easily trained to build,
operate and maintain the Redline private LTE. To maintain some competitor
LTE networks would have far exceeded the capabilities of their people without
lengthy and advanced training.
Huawei builds LTE/5G influence in Latin America
Hudbay, the Canadian mining company with more than 90 years in the
American continent, and a presence in Peru since 2011 with the Mining
Constancia Unit (with the new mine operational from 2014), is directing its
efforts towards the digitisation and modernisation of its operations. For this
reason, in Peru it has been implementing a LTE digital private network, in
order to have a unified communications platform for voice and data that will
allow it to interconnect the different information systems as part of its Digital
Mining plan. This includes the Hexagon IDS GeoRadar slope stability
monitoring system shown in the above image.
According to the network supplier, China’s Huawei, Constancia, where
86,000 t/d of copper ore in mined and among the lowest cost open-pit
sulphide copper mines in South America, is the fourth mining company in the
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SEPTEMBER 2020 | International Mining 35