Like we’ve predicted for other industries, global megatrends and disruption are creating uncertainty and new opportunities for the mining industry and its suppliers. In a rapidly changing landscape, Australia’s $90 billion mining equipment, technology and services (METS) sector can’t rely on its past success for future growth.

METS companies must take action to drive change in order to meet future global mining challenges and metal supplies.

Released today, our Mining Equipment, Technology and Services Roadmap looks to the future and identifies five key growth opportunities and what companies need to do to achieve them.

These growth opportunities represent areas where Australian METS companies can be internationally competitive, these are:

• Data-driven mining decisions – Rapidly evolving digital technologies are providing opportunities to enable both better and faster decisions by making relevant data available anywhere and just-in-time.

• Social and environmental sustainability – Growing societal concern about the impacts of mining will drive the development of new processes and technologies to improve social wellbeing, environmental performance and economic prosperity.

• Exploration under cover – Worldwide the majority of near-surface, high quality mineral deposits have already been identified and developed, requiring new technologies to identify new reserves deeper under cover (e.g. sediments and other material).

• Advanced extraction – Deeper, more complex and lower grade orebodies combined with the need for a lower environmental footprint will drive the development of advanced methods of extraction.

• Mining automation and robotics – Recent technology cost and performance breakthroughs in robotics, automation, artificial intelligence, data communications and vision systems are enabling safer and more efficient operations.

We developed the Roadmap in collaboration with the METS Ignited Industry Growth Centre, as well as with collaborators in government, industry and the research sector.

The Mining Equipment Technology and Services Roadmap is the third in a series of Roadmaps being produced by CSIRO Futures, each aligned to the Federal Government’s Industry Growth Centres.

Find out more and download a copy of the Mining Equipment Technology and Services Roadmap.