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New software enables local mines to shorten survey cycles

20th November 2015

By: Samantha Herbst

Creamer Media Deputy Editor

  

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Three Southern African mine owner- operators have upgraded their mine survey capability using software launched last year by global infrastructure software developer Bentley Systems.

To increase production efficiency by delivering more timely information for planning and operational purposes, South African zinc miner Black Mountain Mining, chrome producer ASA Metals and Botswana-based diamond miner Boteti Mining have embraced new data processing and visualisation technologies that accelerate mine survey cycles to enable faster, higher-quality decisions that improve mine performance.

Each of these owner-operators deployed Bentley’s MineCycle Survey software that ingests data directly from a variety of sensors, instruments, file formats and collection techniques, using this information to automatically generate a three-dimensional (3D) model of the mined volume.

Bentley Systems senior application advantage manager for mining Victor Alvarez explains that MineCycle Survey publishes that data using native formats. “By using native formats, that information can be freely shared across an enterprise, without the need to do transformations for proprietary data formats,” he explains.

The MineCycle Survey model can quickly be compared to an entity’s mine plan for calculation and visualisation of underblast, overblast and other variances. These capabilities make it possible to execute survey cycles more frequently and with greater accuracy by eliminating intermediate steps to convert, combine and process raw survey data.

The software’s open-data architecture provides the flexibility and freedom to share survey intelligence across an enterprise, enabling mine owner-operators to make faster, higher-quality decisions that improve mine performance.

Alvarez explains that MineCycle Survey is, therefore, enabling operations to quickly implement actionable survey intelligence from measurements and distribute that information throughout the enterprise.

“This is going to help them shorten their mine cycle, including the time it takes to go from measurement to survey results, as well as the frequency at which you can do those cycles. They’re going to be using this information to make faster and better decisions to ultimately improve their mine performance,” he says.

Alvarez further notes that the infrastructure software company continues to see information technology as a significant opportunity for operators to increase efficiencies and improve operations.

“Efficiency is right, front and centre for all mine owner-operators worldwide and, considering the principle that you can only manage something as well as you measure it, there is an increased focus on surveying.”

He adds that surveyors are being asked to survey larger areas of a mine with more accuracy and to do so more frequently, which is why they are adopting new technologies to meet those increasing demands.

“We see this with the use of drones and laser scanning, for instance, as ways to address [the issues]. Sensibly, [mine owner-operators] are looking to pair those measurement technologies with software that can help them process increased volumes of data and to do that more quickly,” he says.

Black Mountain Mining chief survey draughts- person Heinrich Pienaar notes that MineCycle Survey enables his company to gather and represent survey data accurately and efficiently.

“The ability to store our survey information on a secure database ensures legal compliance for our team. MineCycle enables us to share information interdepartmentally, thus keeping us up to date with the latest shared technical information,” adds Pienaar.

ASA Metals senior mine surveyor Lucky Molemi further notes that an accurate picture of current as-mined status is an invaluable asset to any mining operation. “The ability to go from instrument measurements to actionable survey results quickly, in one step with MineCycle Survey, [made it possible for us] to plan and operate our mine more effectively,” he says.

By shortening their survey cycles, these mine owner-operators have enabled a more continuous mine planning cycle that increases the ability to maximise profits and respond more quickly to market fluctuations and unexpected events.

“MineCycle Survey [has enabled] us to signifi- cantly shorten the time between survey measurements and fully processed survey results. This will provide a more current view of as-mined status, which will support better planning and operations decisions,” concludes Boteti Mining mine surveyor Moagi Dinake.

Underground Mine Design Efficiency
Meanwhile, Bentley Systems has extended the capabilities of its mine design software, MineCycle Designer, to cover the room-and- pillar mining method, typically used to mine coal, salt and potash. The product extension complements the initial MineCycle Designer software launched last year, which supports the narrow tabular mining method typically used to mine gold and platinum.

Alvarez notes that the new product will be available for general access this month. “With this new capability, operators are going to have access to the intelligent design automation that MineCycle Designer delivers and they’re going to be able to use that to accelerate their mine layout and, more importantly, get the capability to quickly revise designs when new information – like survey and geological data – comes in.

“It will also allow for rapid redesign when there are changes to the market and commodity prices,” he says.

Alvarez highlights this product extension as “intelligent automation in action”, enabled by Bentley Systems software, which uses configurable design rules to govern not only the creation of design elements but also the relationship between those design elements and geology. “[This is combined] with additional business rules and standards that can be configured for an individual enterprise to ensure that, as the design is laid out in this automated fashion, it is also compliant with the specific company standards that the designer is working [towards].”

Edited by Martin Zhuwakinyu
Creamer Media Senior Deputy Editor

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