TECHNOLOGY

Rio Tinto hits autonomous milestone

Rio Tinto’s fleet of autonomous haul trucks achieved a significant milestone at the company’s operations in Australia last week by moving their one-billionth tonne of material

Staff reporter
Rio Tinto hits autonomous milestone

PRESS RELEASE: Since commencing trial operations in 2008, haul trucks fitted with Autonomous Haulage System (AHS) technology have now moved more than one billion tonnes of both ore and waste material across five sites in the Pilbara including the newly commissioned Silvergrass mine.

Last year, Rio Tinto’s autonomous fleet accounted for about a quarter of the total material moved across our Pilbara mines. On average, each autonomous truck was estimated to have operated about 700 hours more than conventional haul trucks during 2017 and around 15% lower load and haul unit costs.

Importantly, there have been zero injuries attributed to autonomous haul trucks since deployment, highlighting their significant safety advantages.

With more than 80 autonomous Komatsu trucks currently operating and plans in place to increase this to more than 140 by the end of 2019, the pace of automation across Rio Tinto’s iron ore business is accelerating.

Chris Salisbury, Rio Tinto Iron Ore chief executive, said: “Hauling one billion tonnes autonomously is an impressive milestone for our business and again highlights Rio Tinto’s pioneering spirit when it comes to adopting revolutionary new technologies which are making the industry safer and more efficient. We are studying future additions to our autonomous truck fleet that we expect will contribute to our US$5 billion productivity programme, specifically Iron Ore’s commitment to deliver US$500 million of additional free cash flow from 2021 onwards. We remain committed to working closely with our employees as we expand our autonomous haul truck fleet including providing opportunities for new roles, redeployment, retraining and upskilling.”

In December 2017, Rio Tinto approved retrofit programmes to add autonomous technology to 48 existing Komatsu and Caterpillar haul trucks over the next two years. About 20% of Rio Tinto’s existing fleet of almost 400 haul trucks in the Pilbara is autonomous. Following the completion of the retrofit projects autonomous trucks will represent about 30% of the fleet.

Rio Tinto has been partnering with Komatsu for 20 years and in September 2017 deployed the world’s first retrofitted Komatsu autonomous haul truck at our Hope Downs 4 operation.

Autonomous haul trucks are operated by a supervisory system and a central controller, rather than a driver. They use pre-defined GPS courses to automatically navigate haul roads and intersections and to know actual locations, speeds and directions of other vehicles at all times.

Want to gain deeper insight and engage with leaders on topics like this? Join us at the Future of Mining conference in Sydney 14-15th May 2018. Click here to learn more

A growing series of reports, each focused on a key discussion point for the mining sector, brought to you by the Mining Magazine Intelligence team.

A growing series of reports, each focused on a key discussion point for the mining sector, brought to you by the Mining Magazine Intelligence team.

editions

Mining Magazine Intelligence Future Fleets Report 2024

The report paints a picture of the equipment landscape and includes detailed profiles of mines that are employing these fleets

editions

Mining Magazine Intelligence Digitalisation Report 2023

An in-depth review of operations that use digitalisation technology to drive improvements across all areas of mining production

editions

Mining Magazine Intelligence Automation Report 2023

An in-depth review of operations using autonomous solutions in every region and sector, including analysis of the factors driving investment decisions

editions

Mining Magazine Intelligence Exploration Report 2023 (feat. Opaxe data)

A comprehensive review of current exploration rates, trending exploration technologies, a ranking of top drill intercepts and a catalog of 2022 Initial Resource Estimates and recent discovery successes.