Canada’s mining industry has been a leader in technological innovation designed to raise the bar on underground digital integration, and Sudbury’s Maestro Digital Mine is a company responsible for a great deal of that success.
In fact, one of Maestro’s accomplishments was helping Newmont Goldcorp establish the country’s first all-electric underground gold mine.
Located in Northern Ontario 11 kilometres northeast of Chapleau, Ontario, the Borden mine is an innovative, challenging, and collaborative undertaking that aims to demonstrate near-commercial battery powered electric mining equipment throughout the underground mine.
Operated by Newmont Goldcorp, one of the world’s largest gold producers, the recently integrated all-electric infrastructure will mean the mine is safer for their employees while having a smaller environmental footprint.
Part of getting an underground mine online for production means embedding and advancing critical communication infrastructure throughout the mine and towards the face. Borden depends on digital technology and intelligent controls, including tele-remote technology to maximize equipment use for continuous mining. It was a perfect fit with Maestro Digital Mine’s primary capabilities.
“Maestro Digital Mine manufacturers Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) instrumentation for the optimization of underground mine ventilation and underground digital networks for the last mile of communication,” explained Michael Gribbons, President, CEO, and Co-founder of Maestro Digital Mine.
“Our products are focused on delivering energy savings and productivity improvements with the highest health and safety standards for the underground mine automation, technology (IT), and ventilation sectors.”
Borden uses fiber optic cabling as far as the level entry or electrical sub-station as do most modern mines.
While fiber optic cable provides high data rates and is reliable, it also presents challenges to the underground mining industry. Extending delicate, fiber optic cable to the high traffic headings (the face) where the data is essential is challenging and the fiber optic cable can get damaged, causing production delays. To become Canada’s first all-electric mine, Borden required a durable solution that could bring both data and power to the face of each mine level that was easy to power, install, advance, and repair on site.
The last mile solution developed by Maestro Digital Mine was The Plexus PowerNet™ - the world's first Gigabit network providing both power and data using flexible coaxial cable.
The Plexus PowerNet™ is a game-changer coaxial communication infrastructure solution that offers high bandwidth and low latency, according to Gribbons.
“Plexus makes installation simple, using a single coaxial cable that carries both power and network connectivity. This eliminates the need to run both fibre and power to new network devices. It provides a robust, simple to deploy, one cable solution for network connectivity.”
Gribbons said the Maestro team jumped at the opportunity to partner on this landmark mine and coordinated with Newmont Goldcorp’s Team at Borden to bring their team up to speed on the technology and how to install and use the Plexus PowerNet nodes. Borden Mine became one of the first mines to integrate Maestro Digital Mine’s Plexus PowerNet™.
Ashton Gobbo, Plexus Product Manager, stated “The Plexus PowerNet integrated seamlessly into Borden’s infrastructure. The agnostic networking backbone was initially installed as a trial system, bringing power and data to the face with Rj45 copper. After proven successful, the system was easily manipulated for production, using fibre to transfer data between the Plexus and surface, and providing top quality performance specifications for tele-remote applications. The easy to install Plexus was quickly adopted by employees on site and continues to be deployed in new areas of development”
The Plexus PowerNet™ can be used in mines with or without a fiber optic network. The Plexus has been designed for the quickest “last mile” of communication.
Maestro’s full suite of digital solutions are installed in over 150 mines globally. Newmont Goldcorp’s Borden Mine continues to expand the Plexus on each new level to provide a solid communication network for full production. The Plexus is a proven technology at Borden and another feather in the cap for Maestro Digital Mines.
For more information about Maestro Digital Mine visit them online here.