07 October 2024
The Bathopele Mine, run by Sibanye-Stillwater, is located in the north-western part of South Africa in Rustenburg. It represents one of the largest platinum reserves in South Africa having estimated reserves of 5.3 million ounces of platinum and an annual production capacity of 120,000 ounces.
A key enabler for digitalisation in underground mining is securing mine-wide, robust and resilient broadband wireless connectivity. Such digital infrastructure must operate and be maintained in a harsh environment. While legacy fibre installations are established and commonplace, these are generally terminated with a network switch at level access or waiting places with limited connectivity available up to the last mile. Without connectivity in the last mile, there is limited opportunity to receive and trend real-time data for asset and personnel intelligence and optimisation.
To remedy this, Dwyka Mining Services (DMS) partnered with Sibanye-Stillwater to roll out a proof of concept (POC) underground network to secure and extend its capability to aggregate real-time data in an active section at the Bathopele Mine.
Taking out the guess work
The primary goal was to establish an easily maintainable and extendable broadband wireless network with high up-time availability to ensure agreed levels of 802.11n wireless coverage in each working panel.
Success for this goal involved ensuring data rate and range were managed and optimised to rapidly upload real-time data across multiple underground WiFi enabled devices. The second goal was to provide a last mile backbone to connect the IOT.nxt Raptor hardware and enable the cloud-based Commander IoT visualisation software to visualise real-time trackless mobile machinery (TMM) availability, alarms and other mission critical sensor data whilst active at the face. Success could only be achieved by a stable wireless network with broadband coverage into the active working panels for data transfer.
Maestro Digital Mine’s Plexus PowerNet was identified as a potential solution to provide high broadband connectivity into each working panel. Indeed, Plexus PowerNet would address two primary challenges. It would allow for the establishment and extension of wireless connectivity from the belt tip to the working face by connecting and powering strategically positioned 802.11n wireless access points (WAP’s) from terminating nodes installed less than 40m from the face with min-ready, high-gain antennas to extend coverage into each panel as well as along TMM tramming routes. Moreover, since fibre splicing underground can be complex with humidity, dust and concussion in mining locations, Plexus PowerNet would enable pre-terminated connections as the tip advances for backhaul for increased installation flexibility and greater data integrity - as a ruggedised alternative to the requirement of irregular fibre splicing performed underground.
As a global first, site survey technology was utilised underground to take the guess work out of network design. These heatmaps were utilised to dynamically design and optimise the positioning of the WAP locations and antennas for maximum WiFi coverage. This wireless coverage confirmed wireless network parameters and maximised time ‘in-range’ for IOT.nxt Raptor units to ‘offload’ telemetry data operating at the face and along designated tramming routes. Stable coverage would allow for a real-time view of asset overall effectiveness, with the opportunity to gain deeper insight by trending historical data computed at the edge and stored in the cloud.
High speed, last mile broadband
Maestro Digital Mine’s Plexus PowerNet was successful in providing high speed broadband connectivity into each working panel. This secured a robust and resilient broadband wireless connectivity and communication network to the mine last mile that allowed both human and machine to connect and communicate in arguably the highest risk and cost environment of the mine.
“Dwyka Mining Services has demonstrated it has the capabilities to deliver on its promises and exceed expectation,” said Alex Fenn, Sibanye-Stillwater innovation head. “This proof of concept has proven that dependable connectivity is possible in the last mile and we are excited about pushing the technology further to expand its capabilities through the addition of other technologies that enhance our understanding and effective management of our operations.”
Real-time network visualisation on IOT.nxt Commander and regular underground network surveys confirmed the quality of wireless coverage and up-time diagnostics of connected TMM assets. This data allowed for workflow and operator analyses that highlighted valuable optimisation opportunities for the company to consider.
“Real-time data from our machines allowed us to unlock considerable asset and operator value. Empowered with this real-time data and ability to trend it historically from our mixed fleet, it is difficult to imagine not having this information at our fingertips going forward, so we see a bright future for this technology augmenting our team’s effort as we mine deeper and try to do so more safely,” said Carlo van Rensburg, mine manager, Bathopele East Shaft.
