COVER STORY
FUTURE-FOCUSED APPROACH Kerkhoff cites many recent advances in OT, including machine autonomy, remote operations, electrification, and process automation. But he says there is still a long way to go: “Mining companies understand they must
change their ways to maintain their license to operate in the future. And we are well positioned to provide OT solutions to the mining industry. Our expertise spans execution and process control through to real-time, time-series data and analytics and a wide range of applications for
Modern software solutions can minimise the risks of unplanned downtime and keep operations running smoothly
production, maintenance, advanced and predictive analytics, process simulation, enterprise visualisation and much more.” However, Kerkhoff does point
out that the 24x7 nature of mining increases the risk associated with new technology adoption. “Any technology set-back can mean lost production,” he states. That risk is somewhat minimised by the fact that most AVEVA solutions are being integrating into existing control and execution systems. “For example, in processing and metallurgical plants, much of our technology is integrated to existing DCS control systems. For heavy mobile equipment, we integrate to existing onboard electronics systems and to office-based fleet management and machine guidance systems. Therefore, improving a customer’s productivity and efficiency using AVEVA capabilities is a lower risk,” explains Kerkhoff.
TRACK & TRACE TECHNOLOGY When asked to highlight a recent customer success story, Kerkhoff recalls that a large iron-ore producer performed a digital technology project with AVEVA to improve reliability of critical assets and enhance iron-ore traceability from pit to port. Detailing this, Kerkhoff says: “The customer had several business challenges to address. Top of the list was that the reliability of critical equipment needed to improve to support a mine expansion project. The client also needed to increase throughput to full nameplate capacity by debottlenecking production operations. Not to mention, the company also lacked an inventory tracking and traceability solution for iron-ore movement from pit to port.” Kerkhoff describes the customer’s
goal as being to produce the highest- grade, lowest-emission iron ore, whilst tracking and reporting production, energy and greenhouse gas emissions. “The producer wanted to enable systems across the whole operation to make decisions automatically on live operational data, using Industry 4.0 concepts. And the team wanted to determine a robust and efficient way to transfer data across company OT and IT systems multiple times per day,” he reveals.
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