Don’t let your data go to sleep

If your mining business is seeking to be successful and sustainable, no piece of data should go to waste.

It’s a required talent among the most successful mining companies that they squeeze every last drop of value from the resources they have – not just to boost profitability but to aid sustainability and become a more responsible business.

Every piece of data you gather today should carry on adding insight to the decisions you make next week, next year and the next decade. After all, those decisions may involve millions of dollars so why make them with part of the picture missing? Especially a part you’ve paid for and invested so much effort in. It’s like trying to finish a jigsaw when you’ve left half the pieces in the box.

There will be challenges around how to incorporate legacy data that may be in an unusable form. Bringing together teams and departments that need to collaborate but cannot. Or coping with the sheer amount of information you’ve gathered and picking through the haystack to find the needles that will drive your business forwards.

Interoperability of systems and data is essential to this, as is breaking down the silos that are preventing data from flowing smoothly through your operation. But how often is that the case in your business? How strong is your data continuity and do you have all the pieces to hand?

In reality today’s data may only be used to address today’s challenges, before being parked, forgotten or discarded, even though it could be shaping and improving decisions for years to come, if it existed in a form you and your teams could harness easily, whenever needed. Data from day one of exploration could contain information on how to manage water during operations, or contribute to successful land restoration when the mine is eventually closed.

Great data should – and can – be there for you through the entire lifecycle of your mine. With the right technology and software it can be a constant, guiding presence, easily passing among teams and up to decision makers, using a shared platform for collaboration and communication.

What’s more valuable to your business? A rich, deep, always on-tap knowledge base that makes available every single drop of complex geological data you’ve ever gathered, or just a brief window into the last few times you went looking for information? Think of the value of that massive hinterland of unemployed data, then think if you would skim 10 or 20% of any other resource so essential to your business, and leave the rest untouched.

In an industry where sites are managed over decades, there is an expectation from investors, workers and the community for decisions that minimise risk and sustain the environment and local economy. The secret to managing this responsibly is to use data pro-actively. The geoscientific data that once informed you on how to build a secure tailings dam could be the same data to predict where a failure might occur in the future. Making data available across multiple expert teams minimises risk and increases data potency and productivity – whether that be defining where to drill and improving your chances of successful exploration or potentially preventing a catastrophe.

Essential to this is software that can help the mining industry turn data into better decisions at each key moment in a project’s existence. That could involve anything from greenfield exploration to measuring your resource to designing the slopes of walls to managing the waste.

In every instance, being able to take a closer look beneath subsurface – and all the information connected to it – will set mining companies on the path to four key data achievements:

• Continuity. Make better decisions on day 1,000 with the insights of day one still at your fingertips
• Longevity. Prepare for the next decade’s challenges, and the optimal outcomes, by treating every drop of data as important and worth keeping. Because you never know when it will be.
• Responsibility. Enjoy the benefits of an auditable, data-based decisions trail that gives confidence to everybody, from workers to managers to investors to the communities you work with.
• Integration. Ensure projects are built on reliable, visible, integrated data resulting in better decisions and greater overall success in every area.

At Seequent our vision is that a better understanding of the earth creates a better world for all. We create software that empowers geo-professionals, decision-makers and communities to uncover solutions that benefit people and the planet. To go from complexity to clarity.

With our teams of mining specialists, we have become a trusted advisor, working with clients to bring insight, innovation, consistency and accuracy to their business decision process, and leverage the maximum benefit from all the data they hold.