European Mining in the Green and Digital Era

The industry is facing surmounting challenges today, such as deeper mining, social license to operate, access to land, higher production rates, but at a lower cost and more challenging environments, both underground and on the surface. Innovative mining technologies, research and education are required through bridging of business, research, and education, to enable a sustainable, efficient, and successful mining industry now and in the future.

MASTERMINE proposes a structural multilevel change for the mining operations, focusing on the top-down axis of Culture, Strategy and Tactics. Culture refers to the intrinsic change for the EU mines, to understand the value of digitalization and environmental sustainability We address the Strategy pillar for the mine, by designing high-level modules that address real industrial challenges. We lead the digital transformation of mines through CYBERMINE, we foster autonomous and electric operations along with smart monitoring and maintenance through AUTOMINE, we ensure safety and stability in critical structures using GEOMINE, in GREENMINE we enhance the environmental sustainability of the mines by improving energy consumption, air quality and GHG emissions, water savings and waste valorisation. In METAMINE, we build a virtual world for the EU mines, introducing the concept of the mining metaverse hosting all the technologies, along with Digital Twins and Business Intelligence to provide simulation and decision support. Finally, we make the EU mine OURMINE, by bringing the communities together, build trust around the sustainability compliance of the raw material and fostering social innovation.

We are going to demonstrate our approach in 5 EU demo cases and one replication demo in South Africa. Our mining partners offer access to a total of 11 mines around Europe, producing 10 different raw materials, including 5 CRMs (Cobalt, Tungsten, Coking Coal, Phophate Rock and Platinum).