The Elements of Innovation Discovered
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LAS VEGAS – From heavy equipment training simulators to the largest and most powerful electric drive dozer on Earth, Caterpillar's 55,000-square-foot mecca in the Central Hall of MINExpo 2021 in Las Vegas is showcasing how the global equipment manufacturer is helping its customers to mine more efficiently, effectively, safely, and sustainably. "After waiting an extra year, the mining industry is ready to reconnect at MINExpo. We are excited to show our customers and the indust...
Swedish-Swiss multinational technology company ABB Ltd. has signed an agreement with MEDATech Engineering Services Ltd., designer of custom mobile heavy equipment, to explore technologies for net-zero emissions of heavy industrial machinery in mining. The collaboration with MEDATech, which largely works across the mining, construction, and energy sectors, is the latest in a series that ABB is developing with original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and technology innovators to...
A research team at the University of Arizona recently received $500,000 in NASA funding for a project to advance space mining methods through the use of autonomous robots, swarms of them. "It's really exciting to be at the forefront of a new field," said interim head of the Department of Mining and Geological Engineering, as well as the David & Edith Lowell Chair in Mining and Geological Engineering Moe Momayez. "I remember watching TV shows as a kid, like 'Space: 1999,'...
As NASA prepares for Artemis, which will establish an outpost on the Moon in preparation to send humans to Mars, at least some of the next generation of astronauts will need to have a discerning eye for lunar geology. The European Space Agency's Pangaea training campaign is equipping some of the top candidates for future lunar missions with a basic course in Moon geology. Pangaea, designed to provide astronauts with the fundamental knowledge and practical skills to be...
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration Aug. 18 announced the winners of its Break the Ice Lunar Challenge, which is incentivizing new approaches for excavating resources on the Moon and beyond. As NASA prepares to go to the Moon with the Artemis program, in-situ resource utilization is of paramount importance, as current methods of rocketing Earth resources into space are too costly. As one of the barest of commodities for human survival, water is the goal for 13...
Experts from the University of Adelaide are leading a project focused on helping Australia's mining sector transition to more efficient and sustainable battery electric vehicles. "About 30-50% of the total mine site energy usage is related to diesel-powered mining vehicles," said Ali Pourmousavi Kani, a lecturer at University of Adelaide's School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering. "This represents a significant proportion of current mining operational costs, and the...
Following last year's announcement of Nokia's 5G standalone private wireless networks, Nokia and early collaborator Sandvik Mining and Rock Technology have announced a partnership with VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland to start a research project focusing on 5G-powered underground mining technology. Aptly called Next Generation Mining (NGMining), the partners say the new project will bring together industrial 5G private networks, edge computing, and artificial...
Many Earthbound mineral exploration geologists can relate to the disappointment that must have been felt by NASA scientists when they realized that the Perseverance rover did not recover a sample from the first hole drilled by the Martian explorer. "When core drilling that is as highly anticipated as the Perseverance drilling recovers nothing, the deflation and disappointment felt by both driller and geologist is palpable," said Curt Freeman, a geologist with more than four...
NioCorp Developments Ltd. says testing has confirmed that high-pressure grinding rolls technology is an energy-efficient and low-emission alternative for reducing the size of ore to recover the niobium, scandium, titanium, and potentially rare earths at its Elk Creek project in Nebraska. Under the mine plan laid out in a feasibility study, Elk Creek would produce 7,220 metric tons of ferroniobium, 95 metric tons of scandium trioxide, and 11,642 metric tons of titanium dioxide...
A year after embarking on its 292.5-million-mile journey to Mars, NASA's Perseverance rover is readying to collect its first Martian rock sample. Since its February arrival, the robotic geologist and its helicopter sidekick Ingenuity have been exploring the deepest and most ancient layers of exposed bedrock across a 1.5-square-mile patch of the 28-mile-wide Jezero Crater, which was a large lake when Mars was still a water planet. After carrying out this reconnaissance, Perseve...
To lower the carbon footprint of the nickel it delivers to lithium-ion battery and electric vehicle manufacturers such as Tesla Inc., BHP Group is having 38.1 megawatts of solar power capacity installed at its Mt. Keith and Leinster mines, part of the global miner's fully integrated mine-to-market Nickel West operation in Western Australia. This announcement comes just a week after BHP reported that it has cut a deal to supply Tesla with up to 18,000 metric tons of nickel per...
As one of the world's largest suppliers of natural resources, Australian mines employ close to 150 thousand workers and generate hundreds of billions of dollars worth of commodities the globe relies on. To make this supply of minerals and metals smoother, safer, and more efficient, Australia's largest mining company has turned to the artificial intelligence solutions offered by Razor Labs to transform its mining machines into smart machines. Founded in 2016, Israel-based...
In the depths of its test mine and lab in Tampere, Finland, Sandvik has secretly been carrying out underground tests on a cabinless, electrified, and automated concept loader that showcases the Swedish company's vision for the future of mining equipment. Clandestinely developed in a facility dubbed Area 52, this concept loader is equipped with Sandvik's Automine, an automation solution that allows the cutting-edge mining machine to navigate through the rough and changing...
A single mine haul truck can cost up to $5 million, so adapting a single large mine to autonomous haulage can cost in the tens or even hundreds of millions. SafeAI Inc. is taking the retrofit approach to provide a solution to existing mines where equipment replacement would ordinarily be cost-prohibitive. Since its start in 2017, SafeAI has been focused on delivering the benefits of connecting autonomy to the construction and mining industries. Based in California, the...
Looking for an effective, efficient, and environmentally friendly means of recovering gold from concentrated mine products provided by its global clients, United Kingdom-based Ocean Partners Holdings Ltd. has turned to the unique metal recovery solutions developed by EnviroLeach Technologies Inc. A British Columbia-based tech company focused on eco-friendly metals extraction, EnviroLeach has developed a proprietary formula that uses five ingredients that are FDA approved for h...
Keeping up with its recent momentum, AI expert GoldSpot Discoveries Corp. has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Ridgeline Exploration Services Inc., a privately held geological and logistical field services firm based in Kelowna, British Columbia. The acquisition will bolster GoldSpot's in-house geoscience capabilities and provide consistent, high-caliber input for the company's advanced artificial intelligence solutions. Founded in 2014 by two independent...
As its name implies, Innovation Metals Corp.'s RapidSX rare earths separation technology is at least one order of magnitude faster at extracting REEs than the solvent extraction methods that it is modernizing, according to results from extraction-rate testing. "The results of the initial extraction-rate testing for the current RapidSX columns are highly encouraging," said Innovation Metals Chairman and CEO Gareth Hatch. RapidSX is an enormous upgrade to the conventional...
Solar energy company and startup from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Solar247 Inc., announced earlier this year a robust new battery technology, HeatStorE, a long duration thermal battery designed to offer a reliable, renewable energy storage alternative to the conventional diesel engines powering remote mines, villages, and micro-grids. "In the mining industry, we see more and more off-grid microgrids that incorporate short-term energy storage systems," said Thomas...
Colorado-based aviation and aerospace company, Lunar Outpost, famed for its $1 sale of moon rocks to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, is now participating in NASA's Break the Ice Lunar Challenge by harvesting space ice on the surface of the Moon. As part of a joint entry with Masten Space Systems and Honeybee Robotics, Lunar Outpost has designed "a system architecture to excavate icy regolith and deliver acquired resources in extreme lunar conditions." The...
In a move that bolsters its own vision of becoming a carbon-neutral miner of graphite and advances technologies that will lower the carbon footprint of surface mines around the globe, Nouveau Monde Graphite Inc. has signed a deal with Caterpillar Inc. to develop, test, and produce a fleet of all-electric Cat mining equipment for its coming Matawinie graphite operation in Quebec. "We are proud to be a driving force for our peers as we strive to electrify our operations to meet...
LAS VEGAS – The machinery is enormous, and the ambitions are even larger for the global mining equipment companies unveiling the very latest technologies they have to offer at the National Mining Associations' MINExpo 2021 being held from Sept. 13-15 at the Las Vegas Convention Center. Held every four years, with the current exception of a one-year delay in 2020 due to COVID-19, the MINExpo is hailed as the largest mining event on Earth. Considering the fascinating a...
Provider of Kinetic Mesh wireless networks, Rajant Corp., recently announced its participation at MINExpo to showcase its collaborative solutions for fully mobile, underground and open-pit connectivity that could redefine the digital revolution. "With the mining industry deploying more autonomous and semi-autonomous equipment and applications every day, they require mission-critical, high bandwidth, secure, machine-to-machine communications systems," said Rajant EVP of Sales...
A year after the Saskatchewan government announced that it is investing C$31 million in a rare earths processing facility in the Canadian province, construction of this important segment in Canada's burgeoning REE supply chain is well underway. "Saskatchewan's new rare earth processing facility will be a catalyst to stimulate the resource sector in Saskatchewan and across Canada, providing the early-stage supply chain needed to generate cash-flow, investment and industrial...
Leading artificial intelligence company GoldSpot Discoveries Corp. announced Aug. 16 not one, but two planned acquisitions to bolster the rapidly growing firm, continuing its incredible pace to transform the mineral discovery process using advanced machine learning. Included in its acquisition spree, GoldSpot entered into a definitive agreement with Spiel Technologies Ltd. and Pacific Website Company Inc. to purchase CEO.CA Technologies Ltd. CEO.CA owns and operates a leading...
Global mining company Rio Tinto Group and heavy equipment manufacturer Komatsu Ltd. have partnered to fast-track the development and implementation of zero-emission mining haulage solutions, with Rio offering a mine site for testing and Komatsu allowing first picks from its future lineup of power-agnostic trucks. "Rio Tinto and Komatsu have a shared history of partnership on innovation going back to when we built the world's largest Komatsu autonomous haulage fleet in 2008,"...