Intelligent Enterprise with Industry 4.0 for Mining Industry

Abstract

The mining industry is under transformation as digital and automated technologies transform the traditional process of extracting ore from rock. With high global demand of raw materials, reduced ore grades, stringent environmental legislation and less profit margin, the mining industry has to improve its productivity through smart mining to survive in the competitive market.

In smart mining, it is imperative to have a real-time flow of information between enterprise level systems and shop floor systems through application such as ERP. A mining company needs instantaneous visibility on production, quality, cycle times, machine status, and other variables in order to achieve optimum operations which necessitates intelligent enterprise with industry 4.0.

Industry 4.0 technologies provide deeper understanding of resource base, optimization of material and equipment flow, improved anticipation of failure, increased automation such as automated surveying using drones and 3D laser technology, automated drills, automated mobile fleets using fleet management system, automated plants. It also helps in monitoring real time performance vs plan and safety of men and machineries. By using Internet of Things (IoT), Big data, Machine to Machine (M2M), data analytics, intelligent sensors, robotics, drone the smart mining will be up graded with industry 4.0 in mining activities such as surveying, drilling, blasting, excavation. Haulage, processing and transportation.

The orientation of the paper revolves around various action plan for intelligent enterprise with industry 4.0 for improving their productivity to become more competitive globally.