Dredge Robotics has developed an inspired solution for maintaining process tanks.
Every mine site undergoes scheduled shutdowns, providing the opportunity for operators to manage pressing maintenance concerns or make equipment upgrades.
But what if sites didn’t have to halt operations to complete maintenance activities?
Enter Dredge Robotics.
Dredge Robotics harnesses the smarts of artificial intelligence to provide mine sites with mission-critical automated cleaning solutions, with the work carried out while operations are still online.
“Many mine sites have wet plants, which essentially add flocculent and wash the ore after it’s been crushed to try and get it to a higher grade,” Dredge Robotics chief executive officer Antony Old told Australian Mining.
“The tanks used to wash the ore have overflows that dump into a separate overflow tank, typically referred to as a process tank.
“This can typically accumulate up to three metres of mud in the process tank between inspections and sometimes they can accumulate up to five to six metres in a relatively short space of time.”
Subject to strict inspection regimes to meet statutory requirements, process tanks need to be cleaned regularly to ensure inspections can be safely completed and tanks remain compliant.
As Old attests, this has traditionally been an onerous job.
“To do the inspection, you have to drain the tanks out and run a magnetic flux trolley across the floor to profile the thickness of the floor to satisfy the requirements of the statutory inspection,” he said.
“This is typically done when the tank is offline, but when a tank has five metres of mud in it you have to clear that first and pumping that out has traditionally been an absolute nightmare of a job.”
Image: Dredge Robotics
During a scheduled shutdown, miners would usually carry out 24-hour shifts to remove the mud using techniques “which are really expensive and time-consuming”. Only then can they proceed with their tank inspection.
This is where Dredge Robotics enters the equation.
“We’ve developed a product where, before a shutdown occurs, we send our robotic technology to site while the plant is still running,” Old said. “Our robot – which is capable of seeing in the dark – enters the tank and models what’s around it during volatile high-flow environments.
“The robot can land itself on the mud, dig its way to the bottom, degrade the mud and pump it out while the tank is online and in full service, and it can manage obstacle avoidance and other things it needs to do to preserve the integrity of the tank.”
With the help of Dredge Robotics, miners can enter a shutdown with a clean tank and immediately complete their non-destructive testing without having to conduct time-intensive manual cleaning first.
This enables operations to not only be suspended for a shorter period of time, reducing resourcing costs and boosting uptime, but it also means mine sites can make better use of their personnel.
“Mines want to be shut down for as short a time as possible,” Old said.
“And on-site shutdown resources are quite valuable and fiercely fought over.
“Often there’s accommodation constraints, because you’re trying to deploy hundreds of people onto site in a compressed timeframe.
“It’s quite difficult and expensive logistically to have resources on-site during this time, whereas it’s easier to deploy resources outside a shut window, such as our dredging robot.”
Dredge’s fleet of dredging robots eliminate human entry and downtime while offering the versatility to clean storage tanks containing different types of sediment, from light mud to compacted clays. This includes sediments with high or low pH levels, corrosive liquids, cyanide and heavy metals.
The dredging robots can navigate sediment depths in excess of five metres and diameters from a few metres to over 100 metres. Liner-safe versions of the technology are available, meaning dredging won’t damage HDPE, LLDPE, PVC or other liner types.
Old said Dredge’s technology is an “easy-to-understand concept” that “no one had invented” until the company’s dredging robot arrived.
“As far as we’re aware, we’re the only company globally that offers this process tank service,” he said.
“We’re gaining more and more penetration at mine sites across Western Australia, including with Tier 1 miners, and we’re trying to tap into other companies that have a process tank, particularly in WA, but we’re also actively looking for opportunities in the eastern states.”
Dredge Robotics offers its dredging technology as a service, which means the company can be quickly mobilised to site to carry out its end-to-end cleaning service, ensuring process tanks are ready for inspection when the next shutdown occurs.
This feature appeared in the July 2024 issue of Australian Mining.
