HIGH PROFILE
an example , with its visual recognition capabilities , the Pangu Mining Model is already working with Shandong Energy Group at their Lilou coal mine intelligently analysing the quality of stress relief drilling , and assisting rock burst prevention personnel in quality verification . The solution reduces manual review workload by 82 %, and delivers 100 % acceptance rate for rock burst prevention engineering work . At the same mine , by accessing to a high-speed camera near tail ropes , the AI inference server analyses the camera signals in real time to detect whether there is an anomaly . When a tail rope is found in abnormal conditions such as loose strands , broken strands , and swinging beyond the limit , an alarm is generated and sent to the maintenance personnel for on-site maintenance , which eliminates possible hazards and protects people and material property during the lifting process . Others include monitoring of the proper wearing of PPE , monitoring of personnel riding overhead passenger devices , monitoring of personnel entering dangerous areas accidentally , and monitoring of key posts , AI supervision and analysis of people needed per shift , monitoring of substation patrol inspection compliance , intelligent control of abnormal coal reload and shipment , and AI monitoring of conveyor links .
PM : The Pangu Mining Model has a layered system – can you explain what this means ? JX : It has a three-layer model architecture with different capabilities at different layers . L0 consists of five foundation models , which are NLP model , CV model , multi-modal model , prediction model , and scientific computing model . They provide multiple skills to meet requirements in industry scenarios . L1 contains many ( N ) industryspecific models . They can be general industry models trained on public industry data . Or , users can train their dedicated models with their own data based on L0 models and L1 general industry models . L2 contains scenario-specific models , which are focused on specific mining application scenarios or mine specific services . Users can enjoy out-of-the-box model services .
PM : What was the fundamental need for the Pangu Mining Model in the mining sector ? How does it differ from a traditional machine learning model ? JX : Mining has been working with AI to a limited extent already . Now , with a transformer-based approach , we can consolidate many of the small models that have been developed in recent years . Technically we are now talking about a transformer-based algorithm as opposed to previous systems that have relied on ANN / CNN / RNN deep learning neural networks . And it has proven itself more capable . From an operational point of view , today you have companies
Huawei ' s Pangu Mining Model enables unsupervised self-learning , covering over 1,000 sub-scenarios in coal mining operations
developing huge numbers of smaller models that they have to develop , deploy and manage . Huawei ’ s Pangu Mining Model can consolidate everything that has come before . It also means it is much easier for the mining customer to test and evaluate the model in advance of deployment . We are bringing them an enterprise grade set of tools ; and with the individual customer we can fine tune those tools to specific use cases .
PM : Your initial partner for Pangu Mining Model is Shandong Energy Group – can you talk about how you have since worked collaboratively with them ? JX : Shandong Energy Group is a very well known company in China – they are a large owner and operater of coal mines as well as operating power generation sites . We began discussions with them more than two years ago , and they were very receptive to more use of AI from the outset , despite having zero internal knowledge or expertise with regard to AI-based models . There is a perception that Chinese state-owned enterprises ( SOEs ) are quite backward and slow to innovate . But often this is not the case – and Shandong Energy are very organised , very innovative and very open to new ideas . They were willing to take the leap and see the potential benefits . We have built a close partnership approach with them . In January 2022 , Shandong Energy , Yunding Technology , and Huawei established a joint innovation center where we have built an AI training facility based on Huawei ' s Pangu models . The AI operation system , which features central training , edge inference , cloud-edge coordination , learning by using , and continuous optimisation , and the AI management system characterised by group management and coal mine execution , transforms manual and passive coal mine production management to intelligent and active management . We have many Huawei expert engineers working there with the Shandong developers and engineering team . And that side by side approach means we at Huawei have really learnt a lot about mining as well .
PM : What are the synergies between the ICT part of the Huawei business in mining and this new AI and transformer based large model side ? JX : I am originally a network specialist and have been working in the networking and connectvity sector for industry for many years . I would say networks are the foundation of these digital solutions . Without a good network in place , everything else is impossible . Our expertise in 5G , fibre optics and router switches forms a platform on which we can run our AI , cloud and video solutions . Also we know a lot of the mining groups , not just in China but also globally , well because of our network offerings . This gives us an edge when we come to work with them on something industry specific , like our Pangu Mining Model .
PM : So where do you go from here with Pangu Mining Model in terms of expansion and evolution ? JX : I would say there are two aspects to our plans . First , we will continue to evolve the solution with Shandong Energy Group into a suite of truly multimodality solutions , including language . But compared to the consumer side of AI-based models like ChatGPT , which focuses mostly on extensive neural network processing , in mining , this will not be enough . It needs to achieve multimodality to fully take advantage of the large model . Beyond Shandong Energy Group we are already applying the Pangu Mining Model to autonomous driving in some of the large open pit mines in China and you will be hearing more about that . Finally , as a global company , we also want to bring the large model capabilities to mining customers outside of China ; we are just fine tuning the model in China first where we have the most resources within Huawei . IM
SEPTEMBER 2023 | International Mining 75