Mine-Site Technology Adoption Survey, 2022 Update

GlobalData's "Mine-Site Technology Adoption Survey, 2022 Update" analyses the results of interviews with key personnel at over 130 operating mines across the globe. The survey examines trends in uptake of 13 technologies at the mine site, spanning mine management software, predictive maintenance, drones, autonomous vehicles, collision avoidance, wearables, remote control vehicles and more. The report also identifies intentions to invest in the next two years, and compares results by region, mine type and company type.

Key Highlights

• Technology adoption is continuing across the global mining sector with rising degrees of investment in areas such as predictive maintenance, planning software and communications systems as mines look to improve productivity.
• Meanwhile, high priorities for investment over the coming two years include safety technologies such as collision avoidance and fatigue detection, as well as remotely controlled vehicles, which reduce risk by removing workers from potentially hazardous situations.
• With a view to decarbonization, mines are also increasingly looking to invest in battery/electric vehicles, with 39% of mines expecting to invest in these over the coming two years, compared with 23% in the previous survey in Q4 2020.
• In terms of the degree to which the respondents' mines had invested in new technologies, the most widely adopted of those investigated were mine planning software, mine management software, mine communication systems and predictive maintenance. This is similar to previous surveys, and there were no significant changes in terms of the rankings of the technologies when it came to the levels of investment, aside from an increase for battery/electric vehicles.
• Contrasting the majors, such as Anglo American, Glencore, Rio Tinto, Vale, Newmont and Barrick, versus the non-majors, the former were, as per previous years, more likely to have invested in these technologies compared to the smaller miners. The gap has narrowed slightly, however, for mine management software, battery/electric vehicles, collision avoidance and fatigue detection, though has widened in the case of predictive maintenance and autonomous vehicles, as investment from the majors has increased.
• Australasian mines had, on average, the highest penetration of technologies, especially drones, remote control and autonomous vehicles and mine management software. Together with the Africa they had the highest expectations overall in terms of investment across all technologies.
• Surface mines had greater levels of investment in drones, communication systems and fatigue detection, while underground mines had invested more in remote control vehicles and battery-powered vehicles. While the latter contribute to decarbonization of mine sites, specifically in underground mines their adoption has advanced as they also help to reduce ventilation costs.
• An additional question in this year's survey examined the use of drones, with the most common uses surveying and mapping, followed by monitoring and inspection.

Scope

• The survey was conducted between December 2021 and February 2022, and included only operating mine sites.
• Respondents included mine managers, general managers and mine-site IT managers, and interviews were conducted via the telephone or via surveys emailed to qualified individuals.
• A total of 138 individual mines were interviewed, giving a confidence interval (margin of error) of 8.3% with a 95% confidence level.
• Some 44% of responses were from surface-only mines; 36% from underground-only, and 20% from individuals where the mines had both surface and underground operations. Only one response was accepted per mine.
• The split between majors and mid-tier miners or producing juniors was 57% to 43%, respectively.

Reasons to Buy

• Assess the current adoption rates for each of 13 key technologies
• Compare adoption by mine type, region and company type
• Assess the potential for future investment by technology, both new investment and future investment.
• Analyse potential investment rates by region, mine type and company type