Multi-sensor drone technologies combined with emerging software innovations are being incorporated into increasingly sophisticated mining processes, substantially enhancing safety and efficiency at mine sites with surveying, mapping, imaging, and monitoring tools.
Drones provide the ability for advanced inspection strategies, such as predictive maintenance and asset management, as well as thermal imaging, stockpile monitoring, ramp and haul road analysis, and in drill and blast operations.
A critical step-change to drone applications in mining has been the integration of artificial intelligence (AI), which is able to systematically process captured data to optimise production and support highly accurate decision-making in real-time.
This can have a big impact on maintenance schedules and help reduce downtime and shutdowns.
BHP has trialled drones fitted with infrared cameras to monitor the temperature — and thus the health and performance — of its mining equipment, specifically iron ore reclaimers.
Thermal imaging enabled BHP to identify and assess critical components such as motors, gearboxes, bearings and pumps in real-time, to ensure they were operating within optimal temperature ranges.
The drones were also fitted with laser range finders for accuracy and safety, so they could maintain an optimal distance from moving equipment while making measurements.
Drones are also being used to collect and analyse data from haul roads in open pit mines, giving miners a more comprehensive understanding of road conditions, enabling them to identify areas of wear and tear, and improving safety and efficiency.
Digital surface and elevation models can be generated from the data, which not only provide an accurate representation of the mine site but enable the optimisation of processes such as ore extraction and waste removal.
Researchers from the University of Queensland’s Sustainable Minerals Institute (SMI), along with eight European organisations, have collaborated in an ongoing project to develop new hardware and software innovations that will make hyperspectral remote sensing from drones more effective and accessible to miners.
Hyperspectral imaging provides multidimensional data with comprehensive environmental and mineral information using a single instrument, enabling high-resolution mapping of rock minerals, plant health, and soil-water chemistry.
SMI Principal Research Fellow Associate Professor Steven Micklethwaite explained that one fly-over of an open pit gave chemical, physical and mineralogical insights that could be used to optimise decision-making around everything from resource management and pit operations to mineral processing and tailings disposal.
Professor Micklethwaite said: “Likewise, a single scan of the landscape surrounding an operation can provide [mine] closure professionals and environmental scientists with data on plants, soil and water.
“It can also provide early-stage upstream information on what future mine waste will look like — an increasingly important topic for companies and society — and then be used to characterise the waste and even inform the prospects for re-mining that waste for secondary value.”
There are still technical challenges to deploying hyperspectral drones that need to be addressed, including how the sensors are tailor-made to fit a drone, as well as the massive amount of storage needed for the terabytes of data produced in a single flight.
To overcome these challenges, the research consortium is building a multi-sensor drone hardware infrastructure, as well as software that corrects and calibrates the initial hyperspectral data in real time before interpreting it in terms of material distribution and chemical composition.