Development of unmanned aerial vehicle systems for real-time mining data acquisition and decision making

近几十年来，采矿和矿物部门的技术发展取得了巨大进展。这些技术进步已被采矿业所接受，以提高矿产资源管理的效率。然而，鉴于采矿业面临的新挑战，包括：波动的市场状况、复杂和较低品位的矿床、更严格的环境法规等，这些改进不足以确保该行业的长期可持续增长和生产力。矿产资源管理中通常采用的不连续和间歇采矿过程监测方法以及根据部分信息和缺失事实作出决策的做法，将不再适合应对复杂的采矿挑战。需要为实时获取高分辨率采矿数据开发创新的解决方案，以便做出有效的决策，最大限度地提高采矿过程的效率和盈利能力。该提案的主要目标是开发用于实时、按需、高分辨率采矿数据采集和决策的无人机（UAV）解决方案。这将涉及监测钻孔和爆破实践，以进行实时岩石破碎分析，监测和评估爆破后渣土桩中的矿石稀释，以及检查和监测地表挖掘和土方工程。在这项研究中，无人机和传感技术的结合将使连续采矿过程的控制和优化。该研究将在El Gallo 1露天矿进行，该露天矿由加拿大矿业公司McEwen Mining运营，该公司在世界各地有几个黄金和银开采业务。* 开发实时采矿数据采集和决策的创新解决方案将使多伦多大学（UofT）在采矿过程监测和优化领域取得重要的科学进展。它还允许McEwen Mining将这些先进技术完全集成到其当前的采矿作业中，以显着提高作业效率。

In recent decades, there has been tremendous progress in the development of technology for the mining and minerals sectors. These technology advances have been embraced by the mining industry for more efficient mineral resource management. However, given the new challenges facing the mining industry including: volatile market conditions, complex and lower grade ore deposits, tighter environmental regulations, etc., these improvements are insufficient to ensure long-term sustainable growth and productivity of the industry. Discontinuous and intermittent mining process monitoring approaches as well as decision making based on partial information and missing facts that are usually employed in mineral resource management, will be no longer suitable to address the complex mining challenges. Innovative solutions need to be developed for real-time acquisition of high-resolution mining data in order to make effective decisions to maximize the efficiency and profitability of mining process.****The main goal of this proposal is to develop Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) solutions for real-time, on-demand, high-resolution mining data acquisition and decision making. This will involve monitoring drilling and blasting practices for real-time rock fragmentation analysis, monitoring and assessing ore dilution in post-blast muck piles and inspection and monitoring of surface excavations and earth works. Combining the UAV and sensing technologies in this study will enable continuous mining process control and optimization. The study will be conducted at the El Gallo 1 open pit mine, which is being operated by McEwen Mining, a Canadian mining company, with several gold and silver mining operations around the world. ****The development of innovative solutions for real-time mining data acquisition and decision making will allow the University of Toronto (UofT) to make essential scientific advances in the area of mining process monitoring and optimization. It also allows McEwen Mining to fully integrate these advanced technologies in its current mining operations to significantly enhance the efficiency of the operations.****