Archives: Steel and iron ore

In late November, the world of autonomous and battery electric underground mining got another step closer as a Sandvik automation ready 18 t class LH518iB LHD was unloaded at iron ore miner LKAB’s Malmberget mine in Sweden. The machine is now 1,250 m underground and being prepared for operation. This deployment in Europe follows the delivery[…]

LKAB is set to add to its electric fleet at the Malmberget mine in northern Sweden after agreeing to acquire a LF-19EB tethered-battery electric loader from Germany-based GHH. The manufacturer welcomed a team of LKAB team experts to its factory and testing ground in Gelsenkirchen, Germany, this month, with a successful Factory Acceptance Test of[…]

Australia’s first new factory built Liebherr electric excavator is now operational at Fortescue’s Cloudbreak mine site, marking a significant milestone in Fortescue’s decarbonisation journey. Powered by a 6.6 kV substation and more than 2 km of high voltage trailing cable, this is the first of an initial three new R 9400 E electric excavators that Liebherr[…]

Mineral Resources (MinRes) recently handed over the first custom off-road triple road train for conversion to autonomous operation by its project partners Hexagon AB. The handover, which was achieved one month ahead of schedule, is another significant milestone in the development of a fleet of fully autonomous road trains. The world-first technology has been designed and[…]

The HYBRIT initiative has received support from the Industrial Leap (Industriklivet), Swedish Energy Agency’s program to support Swedish industry’s transition to fossil-free, with a total of SEK3.1 billion ($302 million) granted for the establishment of a first demonstration plant in Gällivare, Sweden, for the production of fossil-free sponge iron on an industrial scale. LKAB is[…]

LKAB has ordered 12 Toro™ LH625iE cable-electric loaders and five Toro™ LH621i loaders, all equipped with Sandvik’s AutoMine® solution, for its Kiruna iron ore mine in northern Sweden. The order will more than double Kiruna’s electric Toro LH625iE fleet to 20, all of which will now be automated, and its total Sandvik loader fleet to[…]

BHP has signed an agreement with China’s HBIS Group Co Ltd (HBIS), one of the world’s largest steelmakers, to trial direct reduced iron (DRI) production and use of BHP iron ores in blends and progress a separate enhanced lump stage 2 trial aimed at lowering blast furnace (BF) carbon emissions. To support the development of[…]

Most of the Pilbara’s iron ore is moved by heavy rail and Western Australia’s Cook Government says it has taken another significant step to boost local freight railcar manufacturing with the establishment of a new Rail Collaboration Centre (RCC) in Karratha, with hubs located in Newman and Perth. The Minister Assisting the Minister for State[…]

Fortescue earlier this year delivered a prototype Offboard Power Unit to power a converted Liebherr electric R 9400 E excavator previously delivered to the Christmas Creek iron ore operation, part of the Chichester Hub. In a video update this week, the beginning of the electric excavator trial under hydrogen fuel cell derived power is shown with[…]

Metso is introducing a new version of the Optimus™ Pellet optimiser to, it says, further strengthen its digital offering for traveling grate iron ore pelletising plants. Optimus Pellet optimiser is a digital optimiser system which runs the pellet plants at maximum profitability full automatically. The upgrade contains new embedded process intelligence that can assist plant[…]