Insight | Tailings Insight – evolving to deliver on our commitment
Enterprise
Across the breadth of the mining industry, organisations have become increasingly aware of the vital need for a comprehensive, scalable tailings monitoring solution that will help them protect their workers, the environment and achieve compliance. Spurred on by an increasingly demanding investor and regulatory landscape, miners are now evolving their thinking when it comes to managing TSFs (tailings storage facilities). But miners are not the only ones evolving, at Inmarsat we are constantly innovating to best support organisations facing these challenges.
We recently unveiled Tailings Insight, the latest solution built on our award-winning tailings monitoring technology. By working closely with miners across the industry we have adapted our offering to respond to the differing levels of support needed by different businesses. As a result, we have enhanced and diversified our approach to tailings monitoring by introducing two versions of the solution, Tailings Insight – Cloud and Tailings Insight – Plus.
Many organisations operating across the globe already have TSFs where the connectivity infrastructure and instrumentation needed to effectively monitor tailings facilities is in place already, but lack a critical component required for compliance. While they may have sufficient sensor networks and reliable connectivity set up, many organisations struggle to control, view and act on the vast datasets being produced. In essence they struggle to get a holistic view in the right place, at the right time and data is often still trapped on site.
Tailings Insight – Cloud is a software-as-a-service application that has been designed to respond to this challenge, to build transparency and simplicity where previously things were complicated and opaque. It will help mining companies collaborate better internally and externally, with stakeholders such as geotechnical auditors and regulators.
Our solution is interoperable and easy to integrate, and compatible with a wide range of sensors and IoT devices. Because of this design, the solution is able to compile tailings data from a broad array of sources, which is then made visible via a single dashboard view in real-time, accessible from anywhere. It also provides a variety of ways of visualising sensor data to make the management of TSFs easier than ever, and its advanced alarm functionality helps notify key stakeholders about any important changes in real time.
Additionally Tailings Insight – Cloud keeps you informed of sensor health via regular reporting, while also offering a full audit log, historical data comparison and journaling capabilities to ensure you are prepared for future audits. It also enables operators to standardise their tailings management globally, regardless of sensor type and other instrumentation to ensure your organisations standards are being met across your entire portfolio.
Built with the Tailings Insight – Cloud application at its heart, Tailings Insight – Plus is our fully managed service. As part of the solution, Inmarsat also provides global satellite connectivity, sensor integration, edge connectivity in form of LoRaWAN, as well as ongoing service monitoring and management.
With this solution in place, we can ensure your data gets to you in real-time so you can make important decisions and manage your TSFs optimally. We monitor and manages all of the infrastructure (aside from your sensors) on an ongoing, end-to-end basis, with a service level agreement (SLA) tailored to your data gathering needs.
With mines and their associated TSFs often located beyond the reach of traditional terrestrial networks, Tailings Insight – Plus is the perfect solution for organisations operating with weak or non-existent connectivity, preventing them from achieving real-time monitoring and compliance. Our fully managed solution can be installed at any TSF, no matter where it is located, and is well suited to organisations with high-risk facilities or closed legacy assets that are keen to demonstrate a pro-active, robust approach to monitoring. The solution can also be customised to an organisation’s particular needs, so you can choose whether we include particular data loggers or who manages the installation.
After a year of very positive responses to our original Tailings Dam Monitoring Solution, our key learning was that one size doesn’t fit all when it comes to monitoring TSFs. With our new, enhanced solutions now available, we are continuing to honour our commitment to support organisations tackling the challenges associated with tailings facilities. We are now better prepared and equipped than ever before to offer the gold standard in tailings monitoring solutions and to help you achieve regulatory compliance wherever you are in the world.
Joe Carr leads Inmarsat Enterprise’s mining team with the goal of developing unique capabilities to better improve the mining industry. As sector lead, he works with mining companies, integrators and technology partners to develop new systems and solutions to meet the needs of the latest generation of mines.
Joe holds a Master’s degree in Mining Engineering from the Camborne School of Mines. He has spent the last decade in the mining industry, first working on mine development and production and then onto technical consulting, due diligence and management consulting.
