Engineering and Mining Journal - Whether the market is copper, gold, nickel, iron ore, lead/zinc, PGM, diamonds or other commodities, E&MJ takes the lead in projecting trends, following development and reporting on the most efficient operating pr
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DECEMBER 2015 • E&MJ; 65 www.e-mj.com C O N T R O L S & S E N S O R S As industrial Ethernet and fiber optic cable emerge as the medium of choice in many industrial arenas, communication and control integration using the most appropriate products for a specific applica- tion is increasingly important. "This whole 'pit-to-port' performance concept is focused on control and pro- cess automation," said Boyd McDonald, founder and managing director at Datalek Systems & Electrical, Rockhampton, Australia. "It also means bringing reliabili- ty to networks and providing the needed bandwidth. An appropriate plug and play solution is also important because it takes human error out of the equation." Datalek Systems & Electrical is respon- sible for the design, installation and main- tenance of numerous fiber optic communi- cations systems including those that involve automation, security, access con- trol and CCTV systems for open-pit and underground mining operations as well as LNG and coal seam gas facilities. McDonald said that among the more challenging factors that frequently occur at Australian mining sites, particularly in areas of the Outback, are extreme surface temperatures and severe dust conditions. "In the Outback the radiated temperature, or surface temperature, can range from below zero (C) to 60° or even higher," he noted. "Those temperature extremes plus a lot of dust can be detrimental to the service life of typical distribution cable and connectors." As an example, McDonald cited a recent installation in Queensland where the cable and connectors that were initially installed were underperforming and soon required replacement. "We certainly want- ed to provide a durable plug and play solution because it made sense in terms of how to best manage the opera- tions, and communications over fiber was a major part of that," McDonald explained. "So, we went to Optical Cable Corp. (OCC) and described the requirements. They came up with a custom, ruggedized distri- bution cable with rodent-proof jacketing to handle the harsh weather conditions and the possibility of vermin attacking the cable. For a connector, OCC provided its new MHC-III, a compact, high-density fiber optic connector that delivers high-speed, high-bandwidth communications—a more fit-to-purpose, enhanced connection." Also, fiber cable won't cause an electri- cal spark, another advantage that makes it ideal for many mining applications. As fiber optic cable emerges as the medium of choice in many industrial are- nas, the DIN rail enclosure plays an increasingly important role. Mounted to a standard DIN rail—the metal rail used to mount various electrical components (e.g., terminal blocks, motor starters, circuit breakers) in a control cabinet—a DIN rail enclosure provides a central location where external and internal wiring can be con- nected quickly and efficiently. "This type of enclosure is ideal for the production applications, the industrial automation side of businesses," explained Stephen Porach, manager of business development Enterprise Solutions, at OCC, Roanoke, Virginia, USA. "Today the mining industry is turning from highly proprietary communications systems to the more enter- prise-wide prevalent Ethernet communica- tions protocol via fiber optical cable. The appropriate DIN rail enclosure provides an optimal connection for fiber cable that can be terminated in a fixed position." Porach said OCC has developed a new, ruggedized line of DIN rail enclosures to provide highly secure terminations with- in a wide variety of industrial applications even in the most adverse environmental conditions. Available for both fiber optic and copper applications, this type of enclo- sure is easy to install and provides simple patching for the connection of all automa- tion components in a patch field for the industrial automation environment. Customers can also order this enclosure as a complete assembly including connec- tors and fiber optic cables that are cali- brated and pre-terminated at the factory. These assemblies are built according spec- ifications that will meet the various envi- ronmental impacts of an application— noise from electric motors, highly flamma- ble conditions or extreme temperatures. For applications where sensing and communications capabilities are critical, mining operations are increasingly deploy- ing ruggedized fiber optic cable and DIN rail enclosures to interface with communi- cations devices. With or without a DIN rail enclosure termination, fiber optic cable systems for the mining industry often include ruggedized or even military-grade cable and connectors. This type of cable is designed specifi- cally for extreme environmental conditions- temperature, humidity, ice, fungus and The authors of the McKinsey & Co. article How Digital Innovation Can Improve Mining Productivity describe a gold mine under severe pressure because the gold grade of the orebody it was min- ing had fallen by around 20%. The mine had increased ore-pro- duction volumes to try to offset the decline, but it was running into difficulties because this was overloading its leaching plant and incurring higher costs on energy, chemicals, and other major input costs. Taking an advanced-analytics approach enabled the mine to improve gold output in a different way: it optimized its leaching extraction process based on extensive data analyses and boosted its average yield by more than 3% within three months. The first step brought together all the mine's extensive but underused production and process data—not just from its operat- ing and resource-planning systems but also from the laptops of operators and management—and deployed mathematical-model- ing approaches to reconcile inconsistencies and data gaps. The advanced-analytics approach applied in this case was a neural- network model that simulated the plant performance precisely and indicated where there were opportunities to improve to optimal levels. The process parameters of the extraction plant were then examined in depth, looking at an exhaustive range of variables from ore-particle density to flow rates and chemical use, to model the optimal theoretical conditions. The examination identified the variability in levels of dissolved oxygen in the leaching process as the most important driver of yield, a finding validated by tests. The mine made some small changes to increase the flow of oxygen, which, as predicted, generated a significant yield gain. The increase in yield translated into a sustainable $10 million to $20 million annual profit improvement, with no need for substantial capital outlays or reorganizations. Across the industry, comparable application of advanced-ana- lytics approaches to drive yield improvements for commodities with similarly complex ore-processing operations, such as copper, nickel, phosphate, and platinum, could translate to roughly $20 billion to $50 billion per year of additional earnings before inter- est, tax, and depreciation, according to the article's authors. How Advanced Analytics Helped a Gold Mine to Step Up Performance