Among the countless activities that must be performed at a
mining site is the inspection of infrastructure and operational
control of tailings management.
At Codelco Salvador Division, infrastructure inspections of
civil infrastructure (buildings), road works (interior roads and
accesses) and tailings operations control are carried out by
field personnel, for which they must travel in light vehicles
and cover considerable distances.

Identify technological solutions that include the use of drones
to perform the following activities:
– Integrity inspection and survey of civil works infrastructure
such as roofs and walls of buildings.
– Integrity inspection and survey of road infrastructure such
as roads and accesses in the high mountain range, to
identify obstacles, cuts, cracks, material detachments,
among others.
– Operational control and monitoring of the tailings canal
and tailings dam to detect potential spills and substandard
conditions in a preventive manner.

The proposed technological solution must meet the following
requirements:
– Must consider both hardware (drones) and processing
software.
– A comprehensive service that includes drone
operation/maintenance, data processing and technical
support is desirable.
– Must report online and in real time at least major events or
deviations from predefined standards agreed with the
client, ideally 24 hours a day.
– Specify the time and degree of autonomy of the drones:
remote control within line of sight, remote-controlled, semiautonomous, autonomous or other.
– Consider use restrictions and permits required by the
competent authority (DGAC).
– Customizable reporting, visualization and user interface
tools in control room and/or integrated operations center
(IOC).
– Degree of technological maturity at least at the level of
prototype tested in operational environment (TRL ≥ 7).
– Comply with Codelco’s safety and communications
standards.

The following solution types will not be
considered in the background evaluation
process:

– Advisory, consultancy or engineering studies.

Currently, both the inspection of infrastructure
and the operational control of the tailings
management system are carried out in person,
which means having personnel on site and long
travel times.

• Exposure to risks of accidents.
• Productivity losses.
• Costs associated with on-site monitoring.

Permanently.

Inspections and on-site monitoring with our own personnel and external services in light vehicles.

No technologies have been tested for the
requirement.