Tag Archives: Zero Automotive

IGO and Perenti herald ‘drop-in’ battery-electric, autonomous drilling solution at Nova

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The confluence of automation and electrification in underground mining was spoken of many times at The Electric Mine 2024 event, in Perth, Western Australia, last month, with a whole themed session dedicated to it.

One of the best examples of the two trends converging was observed in a talk titled, ‘Electrification and Automation at IGO’s Nova Mine: Implementation of the Sandvik DL422iE Production Drill.’

In this joint presentation, Brandon Cooper, Senior Mining Engineer of Projects at IGO Limited, and Paul Linabury, Manager of Electrification at Perenti Contract Mining, outlined how this new electric and automated longhole drill could provide the entry point underground miners require to understand the practicalities associated with incorporating such new technology.

“This isn’t the heavy hitter for greenhouse gas or DPM (diesel particulate matter), but what it does is allow us to operate a battery underground and get familiar with it,” Cooper said of the Australia-first DL422iE deployment at Nova.

The Sandvik DL422iE is a fully-automated, battery-powered top hammer longhole drill designed for underground mass mining in 4 x 4 m or larger production drifts, Sandvik says. It can drill vertical and inclined fans and single or parallel Ø89-127 mm longholes up to 54 m in depth using ST58 and ST68 tube rods.

The drill’s electric driveline includes a battery package and electric motor to allow for zero emissions while tramming and also reduced thermal load. The DL422iE also features Sandvik’s patented Charging While Drilling technology; an innovation for reduced battery charging time without the need for additional infrastructure.

Barminco, part of Perenti, purchased the Sandvik DL422iE, which was commissioned and put to work at Nova in July 2023 as part of Barminco’s existing services contract, with the surface drilling remote capacities operationalised in February of this year.

Nova, itself, is a remote operation in the Fraser Range of Western Australia that has traditionally relied on large diesel generators for power. The company has progressively transitioned to renewable generation, which has been reinforced by a 10 MWh lithium-ion battery. These two, alongside the site’s synchronous condensers, allow Nova to produce enough renewable energy to power the production plant and underground mine when the sun is shining, according to Cooper.

This is important for the context of introducing an electric drill to the fleet that is powered off a 75 kWh sodium nickel chloride battery when tramming and the mine grid – via cable – when drilling.

While the electric drill introduction represented an Australia first, Nova has been trialling and deploying battery-electric equipment for several years. It has three Zed 70 Ti light utility vehicles (battery-electric conversions of Toyota Landcruisers) in its fleet from Zero Automotive, has trialled the Bortana EV – another electric light vehicle – has one BME ITC L120H battery-electric integrated tool carrier to its name and is expecting to add another machine to its fleet by the end of the year – a Normet Charmec MC 605 V(E) SD battery-electric emulsion charge rig.

This breadth and depth of experience allowed Cooper to look across the industry’s underground mine electrification equipment offering and draw some parallels at the event.

“Introducing a battery-electric drill has, at this stage, a lot more chance of being seamless and successful with far less operational changes needed to be made compared with a truck or a loader,” he said.

The proof of this statement was in the presentation, and some of the specific operational highlights he and Linabury outlined.

From initial deployment in July 2023 to the middle of May 2024, IGO had drilled 50,750 m with this rig, with Cooper saying the site typically drills longholes to 45 m lengths. When compared with the diesel-powered DL421 rig the operation was previously using, the DL422iE was 20% more productive than the DL421 rig’s 12-month average drilling rate of 5,000 m/mth.

Looking at the automated elements on board the Sandvik rig – the first battery-electric vehicle equipped with Sandvik AutoMine® for surface remote drilling and automation – Cooper highlighted higher metres drilled, reduced hole setup times and increased flexibility.

He provided some colour here: “Auto fan drilling enables the drill and blast engineer to put a drill design on a USB stick and give it to the operator, where the operator plugs it into the rig’s USB port to view a digital map of what they’re drilling. The rig itself will automatically test each planned collar location and alert the operator if a hole needs to move; allowing them to shift the collar and leave the toe in place, or shift and drill a parallel hole.” These amendments to the original plan are recorded, with the engineer able to analyse the information on the updated file later.

Following this process, the rig can be setup to drill an entire fan without any operator input.

The second automation advance Cooper highlighted was the ability to carry out drilling from the surface in a cab. The company has been using this facility to drill during shift change or during re-entry. “That feature is netting us 770 m on top of what we have been getting every month,” Cooper said. “And I don’t think we are taking full advantage of it just yet; I think there are more gains to be had.”

While the machine is meant for battery-electric tramming, Cooper said there had been glimpses of the rig’s ability to also drill off battery, relaying one occasion where an electrician was able to repair a “jumbo box” at the same time as the operator carried out a 25 m long hole using battery power.

The battery-electric rig has also required some changes to the way operators work, with Cooper noting that the 75 kWh sodium nickel chloride battery did not provide enough power for the machine to tram 3.3 km (on a 1:7 incline) from the bottom of the ramp to the top. Nova operators had got around this issue by carrying out an opportunity charge 850 m from surface by the rod-storage cuddy, allowing the operator to offload drill rods at the same time.

“These BEVs require changes to the way we work,” he said. “If we can integrate those changes into our existing work practices to minimise the changes to the operators, we will get a better result.”

Linabury, meanwhile, highlighted how the services provider was identifying the new risks and opportunities that were emerging from battery electrification during deployments such as this.

Examples included recognising the increased number of electrical isolation points on a battery-electric drill and creating a live line indicator to identify when current is running through these, charging the battery to below full capacity to make the most of downhill regeneration and more closely interrogating classifications given by systems such as the battery management interface.

In the Q&A session at the end of the presentation, Cooper summed up the IGO rationale for bringing this new battery-electric and automation-enabled machine into the Nova fleet: “As we have shown with the DL422iE, you can essentially drop this in and change very little about the way you operate normally, but at the same time you get a chance to play around with: ‘What does my emergency response look like for this new drill? How do my supply chains have to change for parts? How do my skillsets need to change for people? What do the operators need to be made aware of?’

“You can solve all of those problems, and a lot of those learnings are then directly transferable for when you start tackling the bigger problems of heavy machines.”

Such learnings would allow the company to have a much clearer picture of what it would take to fully electrify an underground mine in the future, he concluded.

Newcrest plans for ZERO Automotive, MacLean ML5 battery-electric trials at Cadia

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Having committed to and benefitted from the use of battery-electric haulage at its Brucejack underground mine in Canada, Newcrest Mining is now looking into equipment electrification options at its Cadia underground mine in Australia.

In its recently published annual report, the company confirmed it was planning for electric vehicle trials at the mine in New South Wales. This follows the deployment of a fleet of Sandvik Z50 battery-electric trucks at Brucejack, along with a trial of Sandvik’s LH518B battery-electric loader.

Newcrest, which is currently the subject of a friendly takeover from Newmont Mining, continued to progress its “Net Zero by 2050” goal during its financial year to June 30, 2023, with the scoping and planning of key trials and studies to implement the Group Net Zero Emissions Roadmap continuing.

A company spokesperson confirmed to IM that its plans at Cadia – a block cave operation that is currently being expanded – could see a ZERO Automotive battery-electric light utility vehicle deployed for trials in its current financial year. This comes alongside plans to test out MacLean’s battery electric ML5 Multi-Lift, also in FY2024.

ZERO Automotive has made inroads into the Australian underground mining space, deploying vehicles at multiple OZ Minerals (now BHP) sites, in addition to bringing an ultra-safe ZED70 Ti battery-electric converted utility vehicle, using LTO battery technology, to IGO’s Nova project in Western Australia.

MacLean’s ML5, meanwhile, is the newest addition to the company’s utility vehicle product line, initially designed as a safe and purpose-built alternative to the use of integrated tool carriers in underground operations across Australia. This specific application context – mine services installation and repair work from a certified elevated work platform with a 6.5-m working height and a 4.5-t payload – was the foundation of the ML5’s engineered design for safety, productivity and versatility.

Newcrest’s plans to incorporate more electric equipment into its operating fleet have – most likely – been influenced by the impressive results the company has seen at Brucejack, with the battery-electric trucks expected to improve truck productivity, lower unit costs and abate approximately 65,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions through to 2030.

ZERO Automotive brings newest ZED70 Ti BEV to IGO’s Nova project

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ZERO Automotive has delivered what it refers to as an ultra-safe ZED70 Ti battery-electric converted utility vehicle, using LTO battery technology that does not suffer from thermal runaway, to Independence Group’s Nova nickel-copper-cobalt operation in Western Australia.

This is the second convered vehicle, and the first dual cab, for Barminco, the contractor at Nova.

Like the first delivery, this conversion also allows for ultra-fast charging and maintains the highest torque rating for a mining-spec battery-electric vehicle by a factor of one-and-a-half times, the company says. Site integration activities with charging infrastructure and data capture will be the focus in the coming months, with the installation of the Geotab GO9 telematic device allowing for vehicle monitoring and tracking.

This is the third vehicle delivered with METS Ignited support previously awarded to ZERO Automotive. It also forms part of the trials being undertaken by Barminco in its role as lead of the Electric Mine Consortium light and auxiliary vehicle working group, of which ZERO Automotive is also a participant.

The next conversion for Barminco will be its upgraded production platform, which will provide available torque of 267% greater than its closest competitor, and allows for faster charging, ZERO Automotive says.

Zero Automotive overcoming barriers with BEV conversion offering

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Zero Automotive is one of several Australia-based companies looking to supply the clean and green light utility vehicles the domestic hard-rock sector requires over the next decades to achieve crucial sustainability goals while retaining high productivity levels.

Thanks to the support of a significant copper-gold miner in Australia, its membership of the Electric Mine Consortium (EMC) and METS Ignited backing, the company finds itself in a strong position to deliver these machines against a backdrop of supply chain issues and ever-evolving safety and regulatory requirements.

“We’ve got commitments for six machines altogether and are in the process of offering our production version to the market,” Dan Taylor, Business Development Manager for Zero Automotive, says.

The first and second units are already running at OZ Minerals’ Carrapateena copper-gold mine in South Australia – Zero Automotive’s home state.

The first machine – a ZED70 Ti™ battery-electric light vehicle – was originally delivered to the mine at the back end of 2020 for testing. After successful trials, the company acquired this unit outright and, in early-2022, added a second Zero Automotive ZED70 Ti to enable its workforce to familiarise themselves with the capabilities and charging methodology that come with electric light utility vehicles.

Since then, the company has delivered a third ZED70 Ti conversion to Barminco, which is now on site at its client IGO Ltd’s Nova nickel-copper-cobalt operation in Western Australia. This vehicle is the first single cab conversion developed by Zero Automotive and will be deployed to site foremen to allow the mining contractor to gain a good understanding of its capabilities.

All three of these machines – and the three to follow – are based off battery-electric conversions of the Toyota LandCruiser 79 Series, a vehicle that has been part of the Australian mining landscape for many years.

The modular nature of the Zero Automotive platform enables its long-life battery energy system to be reused in multiple chassis, lowering the total lifecycle cost of the fleet as well as the cost of Scope 1 emissions, according to the company.

They also include dual AC-DC charging with the CCS Combo2 connection, which is becoming increasingly standardised in the mining space.

Data and feedback from the second OZ Minerals machine and the initial Barminco vehicle will be fed back into the EMC ecosystem under the Light and Auxiliary Equipment Working Group as part of the consortium’s continual improvement and knowledge sharing remit.

The EMC said of the consortium’s ongoing light and auxiliary equipment electrification ambitions: “Converting light and auxiliary vehicles as rapidly as possible to electric is key to the industry building the broader understanding and familiarity with electric equipment and infrastructure that will accelerate adoption across all aspects of operations.”

The EMC is a growing group of over 20 mining and service companies driven by the imperative to produce zero-emission products for their customers and meet mounting investor expectations. The objective of the EMC, backed by METS Ignited, is to accelerate progress toward the zero-carbon and zero-particulate mine.

The following three machines are also expected to be deployed to EMC members, with METS Ignited agreeing to provide some A$400,000 ($297,938) of funding towards the diesel-to-battery conversion projects outside of the vehicles already delivered to OZ Minerals.

“The key thing with all of these vehicle deployments is the ZED70 Ti being able to do the job the miners need to perform safely and reliably, getting the associated charging infrastructure right and working with key stakeholders on the change management process,” Dave Mitchell, founder and CEO of Zero Automotive, says. “Operators also need to get used to the power under the hood and how to maximise the battery re-charging capabilities when going down ramp.

“As a matter of course, we train up and educate the sites about the best way to utilise these vehicles,” he said.

To this point, the two prototype vehicles already operating out at Carrapateena have shown that they can work for a typical shift without requiring a re-charge and can then utilise the battery’s AC/DC-DC fast-charge option during shift changeover to enable another user to run the machine for the following shift.

The use of LTO (Lithium Titanate Oxide) battery chemistry and a 60-kWh battery capacity has been behind this performance. This electric motor can generate continuous power of 75 kW and peak power of 134 kW, plus 358 Nm of continuous torque. These values will be increased to 100 kW, 200 kW and 520 Nm (1,200 Nm peak) for the production version.

To this point, the power dimension has often been the main metric quoted with any battery-electric machine, but Taylor pointed out that safety and regulatory considerations were often the biggest barriers to overcome in terms of getting machines operating at underground mines – a hurdle that Zero Automotive has cleared.

“We were able to successfully commission our second ZED70 Ti for OZ Minerals within two days of the machine arriving on site,” he said. “A lot of people are putting out offerings for light utility vehicles, but the required risk analysis in terms of deploying a vehicle underground has not been successfully worked through. This is rightfully a high bar to clear.

“We address any safety or regulatory considerations during our design process – not when the machine is on site – to make sure that operators can start using them quickly.”

Mitchell adds: “The user case is what we are focused on. That has allowed us to scale our offering quickly and ensure our clients can start running the machine underground as soon as they have it on site.”

Zero Automotive is expecting to deploy the other three machines on its books to the same companies (OZ Minerals and Barminco), but the final two machines of the six to be delivered will be under a revised platform to the original ZED70 Ti.

“It will be a platform that is designed from the ground up that incorporates the desired features and learnings from the first conversions, but we will simplify it to reduce complexity, weight and cost,” Mitchell said. “We’re sticking with the same battery configuration – which has proven itself in terms of power, safety and longevity – but we’re adding some auxiliary power outputs and ensuring the machine is multi-purpose.”

The latter element is tied to the company’s medium-to-long-term ambitions, which include the potential to supply battery-electric machines specific to the extended range space too.

For now, Zero Automotive is focused on getting its machines underground at hard-rock operations, ensuring operators and mining companies start realising the productivity and emission benefits that come with these zero-emission conversions.

METS Ignited funding to accelerate Zero Automotive Land Cruiser battery-electric conversion plans

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METS Ignited, an industry-led, Australian government-funded Industry Growth Centre for the mining equipment, technology and services (METS) sector, has invested A$400,000 ($297,938) in a collaborative project to accelerate Zero Automotive’s light duty electric vehicle solution in the open pit and underground mining market.

The ZED70 Ti™ mobile energy platform enables the rapid conversion of Series 79 Land Cruisers into battery electric solutions; that are certified Australian road ready and extremely safe underground, Zero Automotive says. Converted Land Cruisers release no harmful diesel particulates or carbon emissions and have an enhanced driver experience, according to the company.

The modular nature of the platform enables its long-life battery energy system to be reused in multiple chassis’, lowering the total lifecycle cost of the fleet as well as the cost of scope 1 emissions.

Zero Automotive’s solution is the result of a three-and-a-half year phased design and development program to develop and prove the clean technology in the field.

Zero Automotive Managing Director, Dave Mitchell, says the collaborative investment further validates the customer value proposition and enables the company to accelerate its growth plans.

“We recognise that Toyota Landcruisers are familiar and currently the brand of choice for miners,” he said. “These funds will be used to progress our go-to-market strategy; delivering five more converted Land Cruisers for user trial by Electric Mine Consortium members and enhancing our production capability for scale.

“We would like to thank Adrian (Beer) and his team at METS Ignited for their ongoing support and congratulate other successful industry participants.”

METS Ignited CEO, Adrian Beer, said the resources sector is transforming to meet society’s demand for minerals obtained in a sustainable manner.

“We are delighted to see this overwhelming demand for Australian innovation,” he said. “This round of investment includes technology that delivers safety, autonomy and low emissions technology. METS Ignited continues to invest in Australia’s future.

“By commercialising our home-grown innovation through Australian technology vendors, we increase market access to our innovative capability, making Australia an attractive market for further technology investment. These projects demonstrate the importance of resources technology and critical mineral processing for the Australian economy.”

ZERO Automotive commissions second battery-electric ZED70 Ti at Carrapateena

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ZERO Automotive has delivered its second ZED70 Ti battery-electric conversion to OZ Minerals at Carrapateena in South Australia.

This vehicle was successfully commissioned within a day after a prior inspection and collaboration with the underground operations team, according to ZERO Automotive.

This latest addition to the OZ Minerals zero emissions fleet has dual AC/DC-DC charging with the CCS Combo2 connection, and an In-Vehicle Monitoring System. This provides the capability to monitor the battery status remotely, the company said.

The first ZED70 Ti became one of the first Australia-made street legal light electric vehicles to enter an underground mine after making a trip into the Tjati Decline at Carrapateena back in early 2021.

ZED70 Ti battery-electric vehicle takes trip underground at OZ Minerals’ Carrapateena

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The Zero Automotive ZED70 Ti has become one of the first Australia-made street legal light electric vehicles to enter an underground mine after making a trip into the Tjati Decline at OZ Minerals’ Carrapateena copper-gold operation in South Australia.

The vehicle made the trip in January and, according to OZ Minerals, managed over four complete round trips ‒ from the surface to the bottom of the mine and back ‒ without requiring a plug-in charge.

OZ Minerals said: “A big shout out to Zero Automotive for their hard work in developing such a great vehicle and commissioning it for underground use within two days!”

The Zero Automotive ZED70 Ti uses LTO chemistry and comes equipped with a specially selected battery housing, control systems and charging capability to endure the “hyper saline underground environment” at Carrapateena, OZ Minerals previously said.

OZ Minerals previously tested a Zero Automotive ZED70 battery-electric light vehicle on site at Carrapateena.

In June 2020, it also outlined a prefeasibility study on an expansion of Carrapateena that included a trial of electric light vehicles and establishment of a renewable energy hub.

OZ Minerals on the road to electrifying Carrapateena mine

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OZ Minerals’ electrification transformation at its Carrapateena copper-gold operation in South Australia has kicked into another gear with a Zero Automotive ZED70 battery-electric light vehicle arriving on site.

The company has made its electrification and sustainability aspirations clear to stakeholders, confirming it is working towards emitting zero Scope 1 emissions and striving to systemically reduce Scope 2 & 3 emissions across its value chain. It also wants to consume and produce in a way that generates zero net waste and creates value for its stakeholders.

In June, a prefeasibility study on an expansion of Carrapateena included a trial of electric light vehicles and establishment of a renewable energy hub.

The precursor to the ZED70 Ti electric light vehicle developed in partnership with Zero Automotive, the ZED70 (pictured) is based on a Toyota Landcruiser 79 Series and uses either NCM (Nickel Cobalt Manganese) or LTO (Lithium Titanate Oxide) battery chemistry.

The vehicle comes with continuous power of 75 kW and peak power of 134 kW, plus 358 Nm of continuous torque. Depending on the selected battery chemistry, the battery capacity comes in at 88 kWh (NCM) or 60 kWh (LTO).

The ZED70 Ti electric light vehicle to be delivered to Carrapateena following the trial of the ZED70 will use LTO chemistry and come equipped with a specially selected battery housing, control systems and charging capability to endure the “hyper saline underground environment” at Carrapateena.

“Working in partnership with Zero Automotive, we recently welcomed the first electric light vehicles onto site, and have the ZED70 Ti model in use underground,” Oliver Glockner, the OZ Minerals lead in developing the ZED70 Ti with Zero Automotive, said. “This is has been well received on site as a significant step in our electrification roadmap towards no diesel particulates underground and no scope 1 emissions on site.”

Dan Taylor, Business Development Manager at Zero Automotive, told IM that OZ Minerals has worked closely with the company in finalising the vehicle requirements and the change management process for implementing a battery-electric vehicle at the mine site.

“Some of the things I am talking about here include:

  • “Regular communications with their team on the progress with the project;
  • “Establishing charging points at the mine;
  • “Organising trial test drive bookings with those employees interested, and collecting performance data and feedback from them;
  • “Testing charging of the vehicle from one of their generators;
  • “Reviews by the emergency services and maintenance teams; and
  • “Planning the site acceptance testing when the OZ Minerals vehicle is delivered.”

Taylor said the LTO batteries the ZED70 Ti is fitted with can travel around 3 million km or endure 20,000 recharges before the battery re-charge ability reduces by 20%. This compares favourably with the 475,000 km, or 1,200 charges, it would take for the NCM battery’s re-charging ability to drop by the same amount.

At the same time as this, the LTO battery system will charge to a 95% charge in three hours on 415 V three-phase power, compared with four-and-a-half hours for the NCM equivalent.

“With DC-DC fast charging you will need 30 mins on the LTO (two hrs for NCM),” Taylor added.

Such benefits outweigh the lower energy density and upfront expense that come with using these LTO batteries, according to Taylor.

In October, OZ Minerals became the first miner in Australia to take delivery of a battery-powered Normet Charmec MC 605 VE SmartDrive (SD) at Carrapateena.