Mining

Stumbling on a giant gold nugget and never working again is something we’ve all daydreamed about, but how exactly do they form? A new experiment has found that earthquakes and electricity might be key ingredients.

We're a tad late to the news on this one, but we're no less excited to bring it to you heavy machinery nerds. Australia's Fortescue is teaming up with Liebherr Mining to develop an autonomous mining truck that will, in addition to driving itself, be the first of its kind worldwide to operate with zero emissions.

You know how EVs and practically anything else that runs on lithium batteries aren't really all that 'green' because producing lithium takes a huge toll on the planet?

The "world's first ultra-large full battery dump truck" is being put to work at a mine in Zambia. The prototype will undergo validation testing under operating loads to verify basic performance of the vehicle itself, and the support infrastructure.

In a move that mirrors an Anglo American and Williams Advanced Engineering project from 2020, General Motors has partnered with Japan's Komatsu to develop a fuel-cell power module for the latter's 930E electric-drive mining truck.

Australian mining company Fortescue has taken delivery of a 1.4-MWh prototype battery that's heading for a 240-tonne electric mining haul truck developed in partnership with Liebherr, and will begin testing later in the year.

Swedish government-owned mining company LKAB has reported the largest deposit of rare earth metals ever discovered in Europe – more than a million tonnes of rare earth oxides, which will be invaluable in the race toward decarbonization.

Heavy duty construction machinery producer Caterpillar has built and demonstrated an electric version of its monstrous 2,650-horsepower mining truck, aimed at helping the mining industry transition to more sustainable operations.

The seafloor is rich in valuable metals, but gathering them is disruptive to the environment. An international project has now tested a system called Apollo 2, which can vacuum up metal nodules without kicking up sediment.

Many renewable energy technologies require metals that are mined through environmentally destructive processes. Now, Oxford scientists are investigating a new way to mine valuable metals trapped in hot brines beneath volcanoes.

Extracting and refining copper into a useful form can be energy intensive and requires harsh chemical treatments. But now researchers at the University of Houston have discovered bacteria that naturally convert toxic copper ions into metallic copper.

Mining giant Rio Tinto has announced plans to install a pilot version of Heliogen's high-temperature "solar refinery" at a Californian boron mine, supplying clean energy as well as heat for industrial processes, with operations set to start in 2022.