Northern Star Resources

Driving mining efficiency with real-time data

Vocus helped Northern Star Resources improve the production efficiency of its vast Kalgoorlie gold mine by providing real-time visibility of the operational technology on the site through a Private LTE network.

Overview

Northern Star had a problem: an ageing Wi-Fi network at its 700m deep Kalgoorlie Super Pit gold mine was only allowing its trucks and mining equipment to connect network 40% of the time. This meant mine dispatch operators weren’t getting the real-time information they needed to optimise mine operations.

Vocus helped Northern Star solve this problem by installing a site-wide private LTE network, providing coverage over 90% of the time. This translated into higher efficiency for mine operations and a clear return on investment.

A miner focused on driving efficiency through innovation

Like all miners, Northern Star Resources aims to drive profitability by constantly improving production efficiency.

However, the mine was grappling with a wireless network that couldn’t keep up with the scale of the site. “Our Super Pit is now 710m deep and while Wi-Fi can work on the horizontal plane, it’s not very forgiving about the vertical plane,” Nicholls said.

“We had 80 trailers around the site with Wi-Fi routers and antennas, but we were only achieving around 40% connectivity for our vehicles, while also spending a lot of time trying to fix it,” he said.

The expert dispatch team, tasked with optimising plant movement around the mine were starved of the data needed to optimise routes and timings. Vehicles often simply ‘dropped off the map’.

“We need to be able to make continual, small tweaks and changes to make our production more efficient. The combination of many tiny optimisations adds up to improve our profit margin,” he said.

Driving efficiency with real-time data

Northern Star Resources needed a connectivity solution that would let it monitor what was happening in the mine in real time so it could optimise operations.

“The low rate of connectivity in our trucks made it difficult for us to coordinate them to be refuelled or optimised their route when carrying loads. We were heavily reliant on experienced staff in dispatch using their intuition.

“Even with our great team, we were making a lot of educated guesses – the operators simply didn’t have the best data in front of them to make informed decisions,” Northern Star Resources’ Shane Nicholls said.

The mine was at a critical decision point: it knew it had to replace its ailing Wi-Fi network, either with a much larger, more comprehensive mesh Wi-Fi network or a Private LTE network.

It ran a tender, and when the responses came back, the choice was clear: a private LTE Network implemented by Vocus would deliver more than double the coverage on the mine with 90% fewer transmission points. It could also be implemented smoothly on Vocus’ existing holdings of licenced radio spectrum, avoiding any regulatory hurdles.

According to Nicholls, the LTE network has now given the mine team the real-time data it needs to continually drive efficiency up and improve profit margins. “It gives us the possibility of making those 1% changes continually to make the mine’s production more efficient,” he said.

The experience of private LTE compared to Wi-Fi

While Wi-Fi may appear inexpensive and simple to deploy in the first instance, the Northern Star Resources team learned that its fundamental limitations make it less suitable for users that are constantly moving across distances.

“When a truck goes out of range of a Wi-Fi access point, it has to scan for the next best access point and reconnect to it. In theory it should work, but in practice, devices can take tens of seconds to reconnect or may not reconnect at all. When this happens, we can’t see where it is or what it’s doing.”

In contrast, mobile networks are designed for seamless handoff between cells, even for users who are constantly moving.

Mobile towers can broadcast for much longer distances than Wi-Fi access points. The Northern Star team was able to reduce the 80 trailers parked around the mine hosting Wi-Fi access points to just seven trailers with private LTE base stations. “A private LTE solution costs a bit more upfront than Wi-Fi, but the ongoing operational savings are enormous – they more than cover the initial costs,” Nicholls explains.

The Vocus private LTE solution

After listening to Northern Star’s requirements for broad coverage, predictable bandwidth, seamless handoff between coverage cells and lower maintenance, the Vocus team designed a Private LTE network for the mine.

After engineering design and feasibility studies, the team deployed the network rapidly into the mine, completing the project in under six months.

The result is a network that covers the whole mine from seven LTE towers mounted on trailers. The vehicles moving around the mine are now connected more than 90% of the time to the network, allowing the dispatch team to have real-time visibility of everything happening in mine operations.

Unique Vocus technology

The Vocus private LTE network is not just an off-the-shelf deployment – it includes Vocus Access Control Manager which makes setting up new devices on the network dramatically faster than using the standard network tools, according to Northern Star Resources’ Shane Nicholls.

How was it working with Vocus?

 “Vocus’ private LTE team is very proactive – they go above and beyond if we have concerns or issues after hours. They’re more than happy for us to call them day or night – and we do! Regardless of whether it’s our problem or a Vocus problem, they will always point us in the right direction.

Feedback from the internal Northern Star team

Does Northern Star have plans to expand its use of the private LTE technology in use at its Kalgoorlie Super Pit?

Shane Nicholls pauses and his face breaks into a smile as he answers: “Classic mining feedback – our General Managers now want everything on the LTE network! They’re very happy with the network performance and want to leverage what we have done.  KCGM is now seen as the technology leader within the Northern Star group.”

According to Nicholls, Northern Star is now working hard on proofs-of-concept to assist the geology team with ore grade spotting with high-def cameras connected over the LTE network, putting FragTrack monitoring of blasting on the network, connecting the mine’s shovels and high precision Trimble Drill systems.

“Anything that requires a network connection, we’re now working to take it off the Wi-Fi and onto the LTE network,” Nicholls said.