CANADIAN TECHNOLOGY
Newtrax ’ s CAS rolled out at the Stillwater PGM underground operation in Montana , USA , to reduce accidents , injuries and prevent fatalities .
Newtrax and Sibanye-Stillwater have been working together since 2017 on various digitalisation projects to improve safety and productivity at Stillwater .
OptiMine increases safety and optimises underground mining operations , which align with Sibanye-Stillwater ’ s CARES values of commitment to safety , accountability , respect and sustainability , Newtrax says . These values support safe operations , allow growth , underpin business strategy and promote competitiveness and success .
This marks the beginning of a new chapter with the mine-wide implementation of the OptiMine CAS that links intelligent cap lamps to a warning system inside the cabin of underground mobile equipment .
The system provides the vehicle operator with a virtual view of any pedestrians in the immediate area of the machine , along with an escalating warning system for both as the distance between them narrows .
This escalation transitions from a warning to vehicle intervention , where the vehicle automatically reduces speed and comes to a controlled stop should the system recognise the presence of any pedestrian wearing an intelligent cap lamp in the high-risk zone .
The same technology is also designed to improve the safety of vehicle-tovehicle as well as vehicle-to-locomotive interactions , and will be used as the digitalisation platform for real-time operations management , Newtrax said .
Jacques van Rensburg , Vice President and Group Head of Engineering , Sibanye-Stillwater , said : “ Newtrax provides us with a safe , proactive and integrable solution to our operational needs . The OptiMine system integrates all the telemetry , tracking and proximity detection technology we need to run our operations safely , transparently and efficiently . And they are humble enough to leverage the global experience we ’ ve had with other collision avoidance systems globally , to make their system even better .”
A truly connected mine
Back in 2020 , global potash mining major Nutrien began the rollout of a private 4G LTE network – both on surface and 1 km underground in its potash mines in Saskatchewan , beginning with Rocanville .
Much progress has been made in that time and , as of today , LTE has been installed above-ground at all the Nutrien mines in Saskatchewan – Rocanville , Allan , Lanigan , Cory , Patience Lake and Vanscoy . At the same time , underground coverage is continually expanding .
For the communications projects , Nutrien brought in telecommunication network consulting firm and integrator Ambra Solutions to design and deploy the network , leveraging advanced radio technology from Ericsson .
Ericsson provided the LTE Radio Access Network along with Massive IoT , which is upgradable to 5G NR . Ambra provided the Ambra Intelligent Tracking System and Ambra monitoring system along with services including engineering , 24 / 7 support , the licensed spectrum and SIM cards .
The Nutrien legacy communications systems , on the whole , consisted of an outdated analogue phone system and a few Wi-Fi hot spots . Getting important operational and maintenance information from the mine face to the control room required someone to travel underground to the nearest Wi-Fi access point , which could take hours . Or they would have to physically carry relevant pages copied from a paper logbook to the control room .
Ambra worked with the Nutrien team to analyse the tunnel conditions and communication requirements , then conducted extensive testing to determine the best approach . The consistency of potash and the shape of the tunnels were the two main challenges since , unlike other types of mines , the tunnels in potash mines are low and wide and the rock is very soft . It is very difficult to propagate a radio signal in a low-ceilinged tunnel made of soft rock like potash .
To add to the challenge , electricity was only available at the tunnel intersections and in certain areas of the mine , so Ambra had to experiment
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