Advanced automation and condition monitoring solutions to optimize mining mobile assets. Edge control and analytics to improve machine performance of stacker reclaimers, conveyors, crushers, optimize crushing circuit performance and track energy consumption.
Mining mobile assets such as stacker reclaimers, blast hole drills, electric rope shovels and drag lines are the workhorses in your mine pit, yet highly susceptible to mechanical failure given the tasks that they bear.
When mechanical failure is not detected early enough, it could cause unplanned downtime and lost productivity. Emerson works with your mining operations and maintenance teams to provide online and wireless condition monitoring systems of mining mobile assets that expose elevating machinery stress, capture valuable remote asset data, and integrate it all into a common software interface to enhance performance of your critical mining mobile assets.
Rope Shovel Monitoring
Real time performance and condition monitoring of your electric rope shovel.
Stacker-Reclaimer Condition Monitoring
Real time performance and condition monitoring of your stacker-reclaimer.
The performance of the crushing circuit is critical for mill and flotation efficiency. Due to variability in ore size, ore hardness and feed rates, this circuit frequently experiences downtime due to blockages in the crusher, conveyor belt damage and mechanical wear of screens. Additionally, inefficient crushing impacts conveyor belt loading, which rapidly leads to blocked screens and increases the volume of ore that is recirculated in the crushing circuit.
Emerson can help you optimize your crushing circuit with high-speed deterministic machine control and edge analytics to achieve optimal crushing circuit performance.
Crushing circuit control and optimization
Real time optimization of crushing circuit with Emerson’s PACSystems.
While mines are increasingly shifting to renewable power sources in a bid to increase mining sustainability and reduce energy consumption, many sites still utilize diesel-solar hybrid configurations.
With little visibility into active plant operations and site-wide energy consumption it is difficult to balance the site power requirements between renewable power and power from the diesel generators. This leads to frequent power surges and unexpected downtime.
Emerson’s PACSystems edge control and edge computing solutions can also analyze energy consumption data and efficiently start diesel generators when energy from renewable sources is inadequate to meet the site power requirements.
Optimizing renewable and diesel power in mine hybrid microgrids
Real-time optimization of diesel generators with Emerson’s PACSystems.
Crushers, vibrating screens, and conveyors are critical fixed mining assets within the mine ore crushing circuit. The performance and the reliability of these assets and the overall ore crushing circuit impacts the entire processing operation. Like other mining assets, conveyors and crushers are highly-susceptible to mechanical breakdown over time given the wear and tear they endure.
Emerson experts can work with you to outfit your conveyors and crushers with wireless condition monitoring solutions so your maintenance teams can take corrective action as needed and improve the availability of your critical fixed mining assets.
Conveyor Monitoring
Real time performance and condition monitoring of your conveyors.
Conveyor Wireless Measurement Solutions
Real-time wireless condition monitoring of your conveyors.
Crusher Condition Monitoring
Real time performance and condition monitoring of your crushers.
Effective pit dewatering is crucial to safer, more sustainable surface mining operations. Unfortunately, pumps are susceptible to mechanical failure without proper maintenance. Despite being critical pumps, these are often manually controlled and lack data collection and remote monitoring which often lead to costly unplanned downtime.
Emerson has extensive experience working with the control performance and health monitoring of your mine pit dewatering pumps. Our experts can guide you in selecting the best solution to start data collection and condition monitoring to improve your critical pump availability.
Asset performance management solutions
Condition monitoring and improved asset performance management of your critical fixed and mobile mining assets.
Programmable Automation Control (PAC) of your pumps
Edge enabled control solutions and analytics for optimized mining machine performance.
Distributed Control System (DCS) solutions for pump automation and more
Integrate control for critical pumps for improved visibility and asset performance management.
Tom Francisco
In an Engineering and Mining Journal Article, Shovel Service Suppliers Help Cut Costs, CO2, Emerson’s Tom Francisco joins other mining experts to describe ways to extend the life and improve maintenance practices on these critical assets for mining operators.
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Cristián Doerr
Cristián Doerr notes that many industries have dealt with the corrosive issues of salt water for decades and have learned over the years where they can get away with standard practices, and where they are better off investing in more corrosion resistance.
read moreTo drive improvements in safety and reliability, it’s important to get real-time insight in the health of the critical mining assets. Not only can additional sensors provide early indication of asset performance issues, the use of preconfigured applications that use machine learning algorithms to continuously analyze process data and condition-based data can alert decision makers to act before...
read moreFrequently Asked Questions About Mining and Ore Handling
Mines and ore handling plants that avoid failure by using proven automation and edge technology. Better data connectivity and analysis lead immediately to improved operational uptime and asset utilization. Like many large processing industries, mining operations use many instruments, valves, pumps, and motor controls. With the right instrumentation and edge computing, all these devices can transmit valuable machine health monitoring information to a supervisory asset management system (AMS). With HART instruments, HART-enabled I/O modules, and HART-capable controllers and supervisory software, this source data flows directly to the AMS software. Users can ensure instrument calibrations are up to date, confirm instruments and valves are healthy (not plugged or wearing), and proactively identify issues so they can order replacements and plan shutdowns.
Traditional programmable logic controllers (PLCs) have typically formed the front-line operational technology (OT) automation platform used throughout mining operations. These devices are commonly used for real-time control, but only more recently have been tapped for implementing higher level IIoT communications and analysis. This change is enabled by improved IT computing methods which are merging with OT platforms, resulting in capable edge-located IT/OT controllers. Data available at the operational edge is now easily accessible and able to be processed and transmitted, paving the way for analytics and optimization deployments.
New systems can be natively designed and built to take advantage of edge automation, and current systems can be retrofitted with edge controllers installed in parallel with existing automation to obtain the most important data from legacy hardware and newer IIoT devices.
Edge devices can be deployed in a number of mining applications to optimize crushing circuits and microgrid power optimization.
Remote monitoring or remote asset monitoring is a critical tool for mining since mining assets are geographically dispersed. It involves the data collection from mobile mining assets that provides status and performance from a distance.
Condition monitoring is a tool that assesses machine health and integrity. It involves various measurement acquisition types and delivers the diagnostic details necessary to predict machine failure. Condition monitoring can be applied to stacker reclaimers, electric rope shovels, crushers, conveyors, and several other machine types.
