Unmanned driving reshapes China's high-altitude mining industry

XINING -- At the Yulong Copper Mine in Qamdo, Southwest China's Xizang autonomous region, perched 5,000 meters above sea level on the rugged Qinghai-Xizang Plateau, ore transport trucks glide over gravel roads, winding through snow-dusted mountains and the thinning air.

Despite the harsh conditions, these trucks continue their journey unimpeded -- remarkably, without a single driver behind the wheel -- thanks to a groundbreaking autonomous driving project launched just three months ago.

The initiative is part of China's ambitious drive for unmanned, eco-friendly smart mines, marking a significant leap forward in modernizing the high-altitude mining industry. By enhancing efficiency and reducing environmental impact, the project paves the way for a new era of mining in one of the world's most challenging environments.

Officially launched on Sept 29, 2024, the autonomous driving project is a collaborative effort between Xizang Yulong Copper Mining Co Ltd under the Western Mining Co Ltd, China Railway 19th Bureau Group Co Ltd and Huawei. This is the world's first unmanned transportation system in an open-pit mine with an altitude above 5,000 meters.

Zhang Yongli, president of Western Mining based in Qinghai province, told Xinhua on Tuesday that the project has significantly enhanced operational efficiency and safety in high-altitude open-pit mining.

According to the project team, the vehicles are capable of operating on mining paths that stretch for several kilometers, with a minimum width of 20 meters and an impressive maximum road gradient of 8 percent.

Designed for the challenging high-altitude environment, these trucks utilize multi-sensor fusion perception technology to maintain stable year-round operations, achieving a 5 percent reduction in failure rate and an online operation rate surpassing 99 percent.

The project team expects to achieve full operations for the autonomous vehicles by the first quarter of 2025, with overall efficiency projected to match that of traditional manned driving models.

"In the future, we plan to use the Yulong mine as a demonstration base to expand the application scenarios of autonomous driving technology, aiming to create safer, more efficient, and environmentally friendly modern intelligent mines," Zhang said.

In recent years, fueled by advances in 5G, big data, and artificial intelligence, digitization and intelligent transformation have become critical to the development of the mining industry.

The rapid advancement of autonomous driving technology has also emerged as a key trend in the collaborative development of mining and vehicular systems in China.

"Autonomous driving technology presents new opportunities for the mining sector, serving as a pivotal step in transforming traditional mining practices into intelligent and modernized operations," Zhang added.

Compared to traditional mining trucks, the most notable features of autonomous driving trucks are their high efficiency and enhanced safety, as they can operate autonomously around the clock without any human intervention, explained He Wei, an autonomous driving technology engineer at Huawei.

The 90-tonne extended-range hybrid autonomous mining trucks, equipped with LiDAR, cameras, millimeter-wave radar, and integrated navigation systems, are currently deployed in mining areas with an average altitude of over 4,800 meters.

By perceiving the environment in real-time and making autonomous decisions, these trucks can maintain their set speeds even at night, ensuring 24/7 uninterrupted, safe operations. This enables full automation across all stages of loading, transportation, and unloading, significantly reducing the need for two drivers per vehicle.

"Such harsh natural conditions at the Yulong mine are exactly where technology should demonstrate its capabilities, helping to alleviate the challenges faced by workers," He said.

"The multiple sensors function as the eyes and ears of the trucks, enabling them to 'see and hear' their surroundings. The use of algorithm-driven multi-sensor fusion perception technology effectively reduces interference from winter snow to summer dust," he explained.

To further ensure safe operations, the vehicles are equipped with dynamic obstacle detection, static obstacle recognition, interference-resistant capabilities, and integrated positioning technology. This enables stable nighttime operations while minimizing human involvement, thus reducing safety risks on-site.

"For example, the LiDARs mounted on the trucks can detect humans or wildlife, such as bears, horses, wolves and the iconic plateau animal, yaks. The trucks will automatically stop or navigate around them to ensure safety," He said.

By optimizing driving strategies and power management, unnecessary acceleration and braking are minimized. This not only reduces costs related to vehicle maintenance, high fuel consumption, and tire damage from improper operations but also lowers energy consumption and emissions, thereby minimizing the impact on the local ecological environment, he added.

To ensure the safety of autonomous driving operations, the project team developed a comprehensive management platform, built on a robust data foundation and an autonomous driving application system. This platform includes vehicle scheduling systems, monitoring systems, high-precision map services, and vehicle terminal systems.

Specifically, this platform -- acting as the "brain" of the unmanned driving project -- enables the trucks to navigate dynamic mining scenarios by avoiding obstacles, docking accurately, conducting remote real-time data monitoring, making prompt stops for pedestrians, and planning vehicle paths. These capabilities streamline the processes of loading, transporting, unloading, and parking, explained Leng Ran, project manager at China Railway 19th Bureau Group.

This intelligent scheduling system has also reduced the need for road maintenance and lowered vehicle repair frequencies. Compared to traditional operations, two fleets of 10 autonomous mining trucks can save approximately 6 million yuan (about $834,655) annually, according to Western Mining.

To support the upload and download of various data, images, videos, and commands from onboard sensors and cloud systems, the copper mine installed five additional 5G base stations across the mining area, ensuring full 5G network coverage for both loading equipment and autonomous operating zones.

"The project is a starting point, laying the foundation for achieving our goal of fully unmanned production across the entire mine," Zhang said.