It is hard to imagine that unmanned driving has been implemented in many aspects of mining on the front line of the mine, which is far away from human habitation and full of dust and sand.
In the mining and transportation of mining areas, large mining vehicles are one of the core tools for resource transfer. Compared with urban areas with more complex application scenarios, autonomous driving technology is easier to implement in mining areas with regular operation and fixed scenarios.
Therefore, in recent years, autonomous driving technology has gradually penetrated into mining areas, and a group of smart mine unmanned enterprises have gone deep into the mines, using artificial intelligence technology to solve the problems of dangerous transportation, low transportation efficiency and labor shortage in mining areas.
Recently, Huituo, a domestic smart mine unmanned enterprise, officially announced that it has completed nearly 300 million yuan in round C financing, setting a new record for the largest single financing in this track. This round of financing was led by CICC SAIC Emerging Industry Fund under CICC Capital, followed by Yuexiu Industrial Fund and Bohai Zhongsheng Fund under Bank of China International. This is the second round of financing that Huituo has received in the past six months. The two rounds of financing totaled more than 500 million yuan.
With the introduction of the concept of Industry 4.0, China's industrial system has entered a new stage of integration of intelligence, networking and digitalization. The smart mine that integrates the three is attracting widespread attention from the capital market.
The Trillion Market Behind Smart Mines
Compared with the traditional mine mode, smart mines rely on the application of intelligent, digital technology and mechanical equipment to realize digital control and automatic linkage between mining production systems.
In March 2020, the "Guiding Opinions on Accelerating the Intelligent Development of Coal Mine" jointly issued by 8 ministries and commissions including the National Development and Reform Commission and the Energy Bureau gave a preliminary definition of mine intelligence: that is, coal intelligence is the core of the high-quality development of the coal industry Technical support is the deep integration of artificial intelligence, industrial Internet of things, cloud computing, big data, robot intelligent equipment, etc. , to realize the intelligent operation of multiple processes such as coal mine development, mining, ventilation, washing, safety assurance, transportation, and management.
The advantages of smart mines are mainly concentrated in three directions.
One is to help mining companies reduce costs and increase efficiency. Based on advanced mechanical equipment and equipped with intelligent and digital control systems, it will effectively improve the production efficiency in various scenarios of the mine, and promote mining enterprises to reduce costs and increase efficiency.
The second is to improve the safety of miners. With the help of the smart mine system, through the application of 5G, Internet of Things technology and other technologies, intelligent functions such as risk warning and remote control are realized, which avoids the potential risk of accidents from the source and ensures the safe production of front-line workers in the mine.
The third is to stimulate the digital and intelligent transformation of industries. The upgrading and transformation of smart mines will be able to drive the intelligent transformation and digital construction of the mining industry. Relying on the overall trend of new infrastructure development, it will drive the simultaneous digital and intelligent transformation of more related industries.
According to the report "Smart Empowering the New Trillion Market of the Coal Industry" released by Ernst & Young, the overall market size of smart mines exceeds one trillion. According to Ernst & Young's calculations, the cost of intelligent transformation and upgrading of existing production-type single mines is about 149 million to 263 million yuan, while the cost of single-mine transformation of new mines is about 195 million to 385 million yuan.
According to the "National Coal Mine Production Capacity Statistics" released by the National Energy Administration in 2019, after excluding low-capacity coal mines and coal mines that have been rectified and shut down, the total amount of intelligent transformation of about 4,500 coal mines across the country will exceed one trillion yuan.
In addition, with the support of policies, smart mines are accelerating to land in mines around the world. From the joint release of the "Guiding Opinions" by the eight ministries and commissions, to the release of detailed implementation rules for the intelligentization of coal mines in various provinces, the policy support has provided a basic guarantee for promoting the intelligent transformation of the domestic mining industry.
The double test of technology and scale
However, although the predictable market size is huge, there are still many risks in the implementation of smart mines.
Compared with the ordinary road environment, the natural environment of the mining area is harsh, and environmental factors such as low temperature, dust, and landslides have brought great challenges to the implementation of smart mines.
At present, the main focus of domestic smart mining companies is basically on the "transportation" link. By cutting into the transportation link with automatic driving, functions such as automatic driving and automatic unloading are realized, and 24-hour uninterrupted continuous operation is realized.
But relatively speaking, the technical threshold of the smart mining industry is high, and it is difficult for start-ups to start.
Smart mines are still in the early stage of market awareness cultivation, and the overall scale is relatively narrow, and has not yet become a leading smart mine solution provider.
At present, the main implementation mode of the smart mining industry is still that technology-leading enterprises conduct trial operations with mining areas and mining enterprises to accelerate technological iteration with real use scenarios, but few enterprises have truly achieved commercialization. Moreover, smart mine solutions are mainly based on a single field, and there is a lack of enterprises that can provide overall solutions.
At the same time, the mining industry has many and complex links, and each link is interlocking. For example, the two links of transportation and stripping are closely connected with each other, which requires smart mining enterprises to deeply open up the interconnection of all links in the production process of the mine, and technically cover design, back-end operation and maintenance, communication, artificial intelligence, machinery, etc. Manufacturing, etc., which requires higher R&D strength and capital capacity of enterprises.
In addition, different foreign mines are large and concentrated, domestic mines are relatively scattered, and there are many small mines, making it difficult to promote large-scale smart mines.
Due to the high cost of smart mine transformation at this stage, even with the support of policies, it is not cost-effective to carry out smart mine transformation for small-scale mining areas.
This also poses a difficult problem for smart mining companies: how to promote large-scale digital transformation of domestic mining areas. As far as the current stage is concerned, it will still be a long-term process to scale up when it is difficult to achieve breakthroughs in technology and cost.
After the open-pit mine, will the underground mine become the next blowout of the smart mine?
At present, although smart mines are accelerating in mining areas, they are mainly open-pit mines, and underground mines that are more difficult to transform lack the entry of relevant smart mine solution service providers.
Compared with open-pit mining areas that have already had certain smart transformation applications, underground mines that are more difficult will be the focus of the next stage of the smart mining industry.
As underground mines go deep into the ground, the production environment is more complicated. In addition to the lack of lighting, and the difficulty of relying on global satellite positioning systems and wireless communications, it is even more difficult to popularize. Due to the difficulty in commercial realization, most smart mining solution providers have not chosen to set foot in the underground mining market.
In terms of technology implementation, underground mines are mainly based on trackless automatic transport mine car technology. This requires smart mine service providers to have various technical capabilities such as the laying of underground mobile communication data networks, the development of automatic dispatching systems, and the autonomous operation of vehicles.
At the same time, in addition to automatic operation, in order to cope with the complex underground working environment, it is also necessary to support multiple control modes such as remote control and on-site control.
On the other hand, with the improvement and implementation of 5G technology, the smart mining platform based on the industrial Internet system is expected to accelerate its development. With the lower latency of 5G network communication technology, it is suitable for technical requirements such as communication transmission, positioning, and control in underground environments. Combining sensors such as laser radar, millimeter-wave radar, and ultrasonic radar to cope with the harsh working environment of low brightness and dusty underground mines requires relevant companies to have strong technical integration capabilities.
According to public information, more than 90% of domestic coal resources need to be mined in the mode of underground mining, with an average depth of more than 600 meters, and 50% of coal reserves are located in extremely dangerous high-gas areas.
This means that there are great risks and hidden dangers in the current way of artificial mining in underground mines, which is also the core reason why the country vigorously promotes the development and application of intelligent technology in the mining industry. In the future, the unmanned transformation of underground mines is bound to become an industry trend.
epilogue
Previously, China Shenhua disclosed in an interview with investors that according to the company's intelligent construction plan, it plans to achieve full coverage of coal mine intelligent construction by 2022, and realize all intelligent construction by 2025. This also means that, driven by leading mining companies, the domestic smart mining industry will be in a period of scale explosion in the next few years.
Today, the unmanned transportation system based on autonomous driving technology is only the beginning of the transformation of China's mining industry. With the further upgrading of technologies such as artificial intelligence, machinery manufacturing, and information communication, the smart mining industry will eventually enter a new stage.
A race for the throne has just begun.
Source of this article: New Industry Insights