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Letter – Digitalisation in mines … the forthcoming of connectivity in local industry

Home Letters Letter – Digitalisation in mines … the forthcoming of connectivity in local industry
Letter – Digitalisation in mines … the forthcoming of connectivity in local industry

Silas David

The Namibian mining industry conventionally has to espouse a few new-fangled technologies due to the scale and convolution of its operations, but there are heavy outlays that come with the alteration. 

However, many mining companies are eagle-eyed on the growing implementations of new digital technology and related modernisation. There are three aspects that are anticipated to be vital to the digitalisation of the Namibian mining industry. 

The usage of computerisation, automation, and digitally-enabled hardware tools to take over activities traditionally carried out by human-controlled machinery is already growing in some mining and metals industry in Africa; important technologies to be espoused include 3D printing, automated exploration drones, and autonomous robots.

Companies should opt to devour a digitally enabled workforce by using connected mobility and technology, and cybernetic and augmented reality to monitor field, remote, and centralized workers in instantaneously. 

For example, equipping workers with coupled, intelligent wearables and peripatetic devices which allows mines to incarcerate perilous data instantaneously. This constructs unified communiqué and abrupt, secluded expert assistance. 

Geoscientific Algorithms and artificial intelligence (AI) to process data may help with instantaneous decisions and upkeep imminent prognostications. 

Using unconventional analytics provides a platform to achieve substantial dynamism savings. For example, Goldcorp was the first company to mine historic data from sensors and to ascertain energy waste and usage inclinations in its generators, though depressing its environmental impact.

Digitisation and mechanisation upsurges safety for mine workers. Treacherous environs, poor air quality, curbed spaces and lack of fundamental veracity are a few instances of safety hazards encountered by some mineworkers daily. 

Thus, when the mining processes are automated, fewer personnel are prerequisites, which results in less workers’ exposure to the impending hazards found in a mine.

Digitalisation enables autonomous decision-making grounded on instantaneous information. 

Once data are persistently getting updated with accurate information, it countenances for better, faster decisions.