Autonomous hauling milestone for Caterpillar

Global OEM Caterpillar has reported that it has reached a significant milestone in autonomous haulage – achieving two billion tonnes hauled using Cat MineStar Command for hauling. Caterpillar has doubled the amount hauled in the 16 months since reaching one billon tonnes hauled in November 2018.

Caterpillar commercially launched Command for hauling in 2013, and since then says that it has continued to improve the speed of implementation.

“We’re launching Command on more sites and implementing it more quickly, so more of our customers can experience the safety and productivity gains that autonomous hauling delivers,” said Sean McGinnis, MineStar Solutions product manager

Over the last six years, MineStar Solutions has also continued to grow its expertise in autonomous operations, not only in hauling but also with autonomous dozers, drills and underground loaders.

John Deselem, global autonomy operations manager, said, “Beyond getting better at implementing the system, we’ve become trusted advisors for mine sites looking to take advantage of what autonomy makes possible. We listen to their needs, then work together to build the ideal solution for their mine.”

To date, Caterpillar has 276 autonomous trucks in operation, with more planned. “The push toward autonomous mining doesn’t show any signs of slowing,” added McGinnis. “We have projects in the works with a number of large mining companies either looking to expand their current autonomous haulage operations or implement new ones.”

The Caterpillar autonomous fleet is made up of Cat 789D, 793D, 793F and 797F trucks, as well as a fleet of Komatsu 930Es. The Cat 794 AC electric-drive autonomous truck will be ready for autonomous haulage later this year. According to information supplied by Caterpillar, Command equipped trucks have driven over 67.6 million km without a lost-time injury.

View a video on Cat Command here.