ISLAMABAD (PEN) : A fleet of 100 unmanned electric mining trucks began group operations at the Yimin Open-Pit Coal Mine in north China’s Inner Mongolia this week. This marks the first global application of large-scale “vehicle-cloud-network” collaboration in open-pit mining under a 5G-A network, improving safety and productivity through technological innovation and setting a new benchmark for smart mining.
5G-A is short for 5G-Advanced, which is a transitional phase between current 5G networks and future 6G technologies. It can deliver faster speeds, lower latency and greater reliability compared to the current 5G network, enabling applications like extended reality (XR) and cloud gaming on the go.
Notably, this project is China’s first to eliminate driver cabins entirely, isolating workers from hazardous environments and significantly lowering safety risks. Such innovation demands robust data processing and system coordination to ensure safety and productivity in harsh conditions like blizzards, dust storms and freezing climates.
Each unmanned electric truck boasts a 90-tonne payload capacity, with overall transport efficiency surpassing manual operations by 120 percent, even in extreme temperatures as low as minus 40 degrees Celsius. Huawei Cloud’s specialized solution enhances fleet coordination by updating real-time operational maps and optimizing routes via crowdsourced data, reducing idle time and boosting efficiency.
Zhang Ping’an, executive director of Huawei and CEO of the company’s cloud computing branch, said that Huawei’s AI algorithms empower precise vehicle perception and cloud-based coordination, accelerating the shift from “human-controlled” to “smart-controlled” mining. The project exemplifies China’s capability in integrating 5G, cloud computing, AI and green energy technologies while demonstrating AI’s potential to tackle industry challenges.
To enable seamless vehicle-cloud synergy, the Yimin Mine deployed a 5G-A network – the world’s first in open-pit mining – delivering 500-megabit-per-second uplink speeds and 20-millisecond ultra-low latency. This infrastructure supports real-time high definition video transmission and cloud dispatching. Future plans aim to scale operations to over 300 unmanned trucks for 24/7 production, further enhancing safety and efficiency.
