The mining, construction and quarrying equipment manufacturer says the achievement is also marked by an expansion of the types of commodities hauled autonomously across a growing number of Cat mining truck class sizes, as well as other brands of mining equipment.
“Since surpassing the two billion tonnes milestone, we’ve equipped more mines with Command trucks and have established the world’s first gold mining application with Command for hauling,” said Jim Hawkins, director of Cat MineStar Solutions. “Since surpassing one billion tonnes, we’ve expanded our Command fleet by nearly 250%.”
Caterpillar's Command autonomous haulage system (AHS) fleets operate across three continents – North America, South America and Australia – at 17 mine locations, operated by nine different customers. Commodities mined using the Cat Command include iron ore, oil sands, copper, coal and gold.
Command for hauling trucks now span class sizes from 190 to 360 tonnes (210 to 400 tons). The Cat line of Command models include the Cat 789D, 793D, 793F, 797F and the 297-tonne (327-ton) 794 AC with electric drive.
Command retrofit kits are available for Cat mining trucks as well as other brands of trucks and loading equipment. Since the first autonomous Cat trucks were commissioned in 2013, these AHS models have traveled more than 110 million km (68.3 million miles), equivalent to a minimum-distance, straight-line roundtrip journey to Mars, with no lost-time injuries associated with automated truck operation.
Cat says that customers using Command for hauling report significant gains in productivity and truck utilization rates with lower costs per tonne. It adds that customers have seen up to 30% higher productivity.
“Consistent with previous milestone trends, we anticipate crossing the 4 billion tonnes threshold at even a faster pace than achieving 3 billion tonnes,” said Marc Cameron, vice president, Caterpillar Resource Industries.
“Looking forward, we are planning the expansion of Command for hauling to include our 140-tonne (150-ton) class Cat 785 mining truck.”
