IoT Explained
22 August 2025
Reading Time: 9 mins
Eseye
IoT Hardware and Connectivity Specialists
LinkedInThe mining industry is traditionally one of the most conservative sectors when it comes to adopting new technologies. But around the world, ore grades are in decline, reserves are more dispersed, and costs to extract metals and minerals from the ground are rising.
Furthermore, mining companies are facing growing pressures to tackle climate and ESG challenges as well as to improve worker safety and wellbeing.
This is where technologies including IoT, robotic automation, and AI have a lot to offer in terms of enabling smart mining operations through adoption of automated drilling tools, robotic machinery, self-driving vehicles, and preventative maintenance of equipment.
Sitting on a gold mine of data: What is smart mining?
Historically, mining has relied on lengthy manual processes for tasks like resource exploration and ore grade estimation. Lengthy drilling campaigns would start the process, while knowledgeable humans would analyze the geological samples and the surveys assisted by point technologies.
But mining operations generate vast amounts of data from drilling equipment, hauling vehicles, surveying tools, processing plants, and more. If these data points are effectively captured and analyzed they can transform how miners identify the most promising sites, reduce time to dig, and ensure the most cost-effective extraction.
Data analytics leverage IoT sensors to collect large volumes of data at every point from exploration, extraction, collection, processing, to logistics, to identify patterns and generate actionable insights.
This helps miners reduce exploration cost and risk and deploy resources where the potential for success is highest.
IoT in smart mining
Sensors on mining machinery and vehicles, geological surveying tools, satellite imagery, real-time operational monitoring systems, and environmental readings can all generate useful insights.
Big data analytics in smart mining
Big data analytics platforms integrate these complex datasets to model ore grades more accurately, drive more targeted drilling and maximize yield, as well as find new economies in logistics.
AI and ML in smart mining
AI and Machine Learning take the potential for analytics even further, massively scaling more advanced techniques like predictive modelling and surfacing more actionable insights from complex datasets.
Challenges facing the mining industry
Operational efficiency
After centuries of mining, ore grades are on a declining trajectory with gold and copper a particular concern due to the significant role the base metals play in the global economy. Lower grade ore extraction requires more labor and energy-intensive approaches meaning a rise in operational costs for mining companies.
Processing these larger quantities of lower-grade materials also drives up energy costs.
Equipment and asset utilization
Mining equipment is highly specialized and represents significant capital investments, often running into millions of dollars per unit. It is essential that mining operations extract maximum value from equipment by maximizing uptime and optimizing fleet performance. Traditional reactive maintenance approaches result in costly unplanned shutdowns and reduced equipment lifecycles.
ESG compliance
Energy is one of the main constraints in mining, where it currently sits at around 38% of the total cost, as well as being a substantial source of greenhouse gas emissions. The industry still relies primarily on fossil fuels, consuming about 19% of global coal products.
With the industry on a path to more energy intensive approaches to mining, there is a significant pressure from environmental and regulatory quarters to reduce the dependency on fossil fuels, adopt renewables, and take a more stringent approach to environmental protection, including real-time monitoring of air quality, water usage, waste management, and carbon emissions.
Safety and risk management
Mining remains one of the world’s most hazardous industries. It has one of the highest accident rates among all sectors, accounting for 8% of fatal occupation incidents globally, despite employing just 1% of all workers.
Risks to workers range from equipment failures, to cave-ins, to toxic gas exposure and extreme environmental conditions. Mining can also create environmental hazards affecting local populations, such as flooding, structural collapse, and pollution of water sources.
Labor challenges
The mining industry is facing a significant labor shortage driven by an aging workforce and difficulty attracting younger talent, particularly in remote locations where mining is more prevalent.
As well as replacing mature workers in traditional mining roles, the lack of specialized technical skills such as robotics, automation, and data science is partly responsible for stalling adoption of new technology.
Opportunities for IoT in smart mining operations
IoT and cellular connectivity can form a technological backbone that enables mining operations to address the above challenges through intelligent, interconnected systems.
At the current rate of adoption, the equipment segment accounts for the largest share of the total installed base of connected mining solutions, including IoT devices deployed on machines and vehicles used in mining operations.
Next we have the environment segment, which includes sensors for environmental monitoring of
the mine itself and can extend to things like air quality and water level monitoring.
While the people segment is another significant area for IoT disruption and consists of various solutions
deployed to support the safety and productivity of mining personnel.
Berg Insight estimates that the total installed base of connected mining solutions reached close to 1.3 million units in use worldwide across the equipment, people and environment segments in 2023.
The development of autonomous vehicles has been going on for years in the mining sector with Autonomous haulage systems (AHS) improving safety and reducing operating costs.
The world’s first purpose-built automated mine is the Syama Gold Mine in Mali, West Africa, owned by Resolute Mining. The mine, which opened in 2018, employs a fully automated system for various operations, including robotic drills and driverless trucks, operating 24/7. It is said to be up to 30% more efficient than conventional mining operations and still employs around 1,500 people to oversee operations.
It is expected that fully automated mines will become increasingly common in the future due to their ability to enable operations that are safer, more efficient and sustainable.
IoT applications and solutions in smart mining
Enhanced safety
Wearable IoT devices and smart safety equipment can monitor worker vital signs and fatigue levels, location, and exposure to hazardous conditions.
Environmental sensors can detect dangerous gases, low oxygen levels, noise levels, water contamination, dust particles, seismic activity and other environmental risks, triggering automated alerts and safety protocols.
Efficiency and productivity
IoT sensors embedded in critical mining equipment can monitor vibration patterns, temperature fluctuations, fluid levels, and performance metrics in real-time. Sensors on equipment and infrastructure can not only assist in automation of machinery, but can also provide a constant stream of data on performance, wear and tear, and resource consumption.
Data insights can help optimize resource usage, while predictive maintenance minimizes downtime.
Fleet management and logistics
IoT connectivity enables end-to-end visibility across the mining supply chain including hundreds of vehicles and machines. This can assist in asset location, optimized inventory levels, and streamlining of logistics operations.
Advanced analytics can identify underutilized assets and optimize fleet composition to reduce capital expenditures.
Environmental sustainability and compliance
IoT sensors in smart mining practices can help minimize waste, optimize energy consumption, and reduce emissions, contributing to more sustainable mining operations and compliance with ESG targets.
Smart mining encourages better management of water, energy, and other resources, promoting responsible resource utilization while minimizing pollution and environmental damage.
Autonomous vehicles
IoT connectivity enables autonomous mining vehicles, including self-driving haul trucks, drilling rigs, and loading equipment. These vehicles rely on networks of IoT sensors and cameras to navigate mining sites safely and efficiently.
Predictive maintenance
IoT sensors embedded in equipment transforms maintenance from a reactive to a proactive discipline, significantly reducing costs and improving equipment reliability.
Energy management and optimization
Smart energy management systems can automatically adjust operations based on electricity pricing and assist in the transition to renewable energy sources.
Water management
IoT systems monitor water quality, usage, and treatment processes across mining sites as well as being a key part of anti-flood defences.
Geological and exploration data analysis
IoT sensors deployed in exploration drilling continuously collect geological data, including ore grade measurements, structural information, and resource estimates. This data can be fed into analytics systems to improve mine planning accuracy and help optimize extraction strategies.
The data can also enhance safety by providing early warning of potential ground instability or other geological hazards.
Digital twins
Digital twins enabled by IoT sensors are becoming a disruptive force in several industries, including mining. Data gathered by IoT sensors is used to create virtual replicas of mining operations that mirror real-world conditions in real-time.
Digital twins enable mining engineers to manipulate the digital environment to simulate different operational scenarios and predict the impact of changes before implementation.
With the adoption of big data analytics, AI and ML, advanced platforms can process the massive volumes of data generated by IoT systems and identify patterns and insights that would be impossible to detect manually or with previous generations of compute technology.
What’s holding up smart mining adoption?
Despite the opportunities, there remain several key challenges to smart or intelligent mining, some of which are technological and some of which are human.
One of the key obstacles, and a very human problem, is lack of skills. The mining sector has an aging workforce and relies on a more traditional skill set. Implementing and managing IoT systems requires technical expertise that may not exist within traditional mining organizations.
In a similar vein, there is a large estate of old but very expensive mining equipment in use, which mining companies are still getting some return out of even if it is diminishing. This presents a consideration on whether to retrofit existing equipment with new technology such as IoT sensors or deploy brand new modern machines.
An extension of this challenge is integration with legacy systems, often provided by multiple vendors, which may in some cases be decades old. As ever, in the modern world this also introduces various cybersecurity challenges.
A perhaps more obvious challenge is the harsh environment of a mine. Mining environments are among the most challenging deployments for electronic equipment, with extreme temperatures, vibration, dust, moisture, and corrosive substances to consider.
Many mining operations are also located in remote areas with limited or no cellular coverage. The fact that mines are underground also makes reliable connectivity a significant challenge, meaning mining companies often need to invest in private networks or local connectivity solutions that backhaul to the cloud or internet.
Choosing the right IoT solutions for smart mining
The unique challenges of mining environments require specialized connectivity and IoT device solutions that can maintain performance in harsh conditions and remote locations.
Ruggedized devices
From a hardware perspective, IoT devices must be designed to withstand the extreme conditions typical in mining environments. This includes resistance to dust, moisture, vibration, and wide temperature ranges.
Resilient connectivity
IoT facilitates the deployment of robotics and automated systems, but such systems rely on stable and resilient connectivity.
Mining operations benefit from IoT connectivity solutions that can access multiple networks or protocols automatically, ensuring continuous connectivity even when individual networks experience outages or coverage gaps.
Because direct cellular connectivity is not always possible, many mining networks rely on high-speed, low-latency wireless technologies like private 5G and WiFi 6 to enable seamless connectivity and data transfer across the mining site. Private 5G LTE networks are also a popular choice for connectivity on the campus, with cellular or satellite providing backhaul across the internet.
Whichever technology you choose also needs to be able to scale seamlessly, as mines are expansive projects that become harder to connect the deeper they go.
Many mining companies also operate in multiple countries and remote locations worldwide. IoT connectivity solutions must provide consistent performance and management capabilities across diverse geographic regions and regulatory environments, introducing considerations around roaming or localization.
The future of connectivity in smart mining
Technologies such as IoT will be key to the adoption of smart mining. This long traditional sector is under pressure to drive greater efficiencies and extract more value from an ever-depleting source, while complying with stringent environmental and regulatory concerns.
The convergence of IoT, AI, robotics and automation, and advanced analytics is creating new possibilities for mining operations that can operate more safely, efficiently, and sustainably than traditional methods.
In fact, 71% of mining companies recognize robotics and automation as having the greatest future impact on mining, according to consultancy BDO. Meanwhile, the World Economic Forum argues that the mining industry is evolving from simply being a source of raw materials, to becoming a secure, responsible provider of critical resources. But this is only achievable through collaboration across multiple sectors to address urgent global challenges in climate, energy, and infrastructure, among other areas.
Connectivity is a key enabler of this transformation.
Eseye’s AnyNet SMARTconnect gives IoT devices the intelligence to swap to another network if connectivity drops, and future-proofs the device by allowing new networks and operators to be easily introduced. It also provides the building blocks to enable connectivity applets with access to multiple RATs – for example cellular, Zigbee, Thread, Bluetooth, LoRaWAN and satellite.
Meanwhile, Hera – our range of specialist IoT edge hardware – meets your evolving IoT needs for ruggedness and reliability.
The hardware and software is underpinned by Eseye’s Infinity IoT Platform, connectivity management software that gives operators oversight and control of the entire smart device estate from a single pane of glass. This makes it possible to optimize connectivity for each device, as well provide full-lifecycle management.
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