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As the demand for greater energy consumption and economic development grows, so does the demand for critical materials and commodities. And, for those who descend into the depths of the Earth in search of those materials, this means digging deeper. With the toll this can take on workers and their equipment, it has the potential to make one of the most challenging jobs in the world harder.

Augusto Fernandes, Product Application Specialist – Mining Americas, and Michael Longbottom, Global LubeExpert Coach, Shell Lubricant Solutions, bring new perspectives on how underground miners can meet growing demand by reaching new levels of productivity – unlocking performance improvements through effective lubrication, equipment maintenance and hands on services.

Michael Longbottom: There are a range of challenges in underground mining that are specific to underground and uncommon in open pit mines. Firstly, underground mine shafts are hot and humid. This means that ventilation and the continuous circulation of quantity and quality of air is a priority (as is providing the energy to power this). You can’t send people and equipment down into the mine without that in place.

On the equipment side, it’s easy to envisage the huge excavators and haulers used by open pit mines, but underground it’s a bit different. Equipment is much smaller because it must be to navigate the narrow tunnels. With a wider variety of machines on site, there’s greater potential for faults and failures for maintenance teams to manage. It’s also hard to supervise mining operations deep underground. From a maintenance perspective, there’s no easy way to access these mines, which can open the door to poor maintenance practices which can lead to equipment breakdowns.

Augusto Fernandes: As Michael says, deep mines present new challenges for the miners digging them. The deeper the tunnels reach, the higher the temperature at which people and equipment must operate, which in turn increases the operational challenges. It is why ventilation is critical – and why effective equipment maintenance shouldn’t be overlooked. Inadequate or insufficient maintenance practices can lead to increased downtime and the unsafe operation of equipment, putting both safety and productivity at risk.

What impact do these have on the equipment?

ML: Lubricants may not be a priority for underground miners which can make conversations on the topic challenging. Cost is understandably a critical factor for miners and there’s usually a preference for cheaper products, but these often don’t provide a solution to the challenge - they can often exacerbate things. Our role as lubricant experts is to help underground miners understand how higher performance products and best practice services can continuously help miners meet their performance and profitability goals by achieving higher productivity.

AF: Lubricants are often perceived as a consumable, or a cost, not as an asset by underground miners. And when underground miners do look at their supply of lubricants, reducing purchasing costs quickly becomes the focus. But we see that as the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the total cost of maintenance. The cost of lubricant products is significantly outweighed by the cost that comes with using them ineffectively. In other words, quick, short-term and one-off gains (reduced purchasing costs of lubricants) incur much higher losses year on year.

The shortened lifecycle of underground mining equipment means there’s an opportunity for quality lubricants and lubrication best practices to deliver significant productivity gains by making the most of – and even extending – that lifecycle. Small changes within mining maintenance practices can compound and have a big impact on operations overall. That’s why we work to equip underground miners with the right knowledge about lubricants and lubrication management.

AF: For me, audits and site assessments are vital. They allow you to get a closer look at what’s happening on the ground with the equipment, the lubricant and overall maintenance practices. This makes it easier to identify any barriers to productivity and make recommendations designed to deliver tangible cost savings and added business value.

The recommendations we make include overarching concepts like preventive maintenance – which can help to avoid unplanned downtime, therefore reducing operating costs and improving productivity. We also see training on how to improve the standard of lubrication and get the most from high performance consumables as essential. This sits alongside the use of services like Shell LubeAnalyst and Shell RemoteSense, which enable site teams to make further productivity gains through effective predictive maintenance management. Ultimately, if you can work with the miner to jointly demonstrate the value of your approach, you can begin to shift the mindset.

ML: Another challenge we face in this area is the turnover in site management. You’ll often see someone new come into the business who has a renewed focus on cost reduction and doesn’t see the immediate or ongoing value of using the right lubricant and lubrication programmes.

It’s why, as Augusto said, you need to keep demonstrating the value of high performance lubricants and lubrication best practices to avoid good intentions (cost optimisation) leading to unsuccessful outcome (higher costs, downtime and productivity losses).

What steps can miners take to realise the value of their maintenance programmes?

Just as underground miners need to dig deeper to meet society’s growing demand for critical materials, they also need to look beyond the tip of the iceberg that the purchasing cost of lubricants represent if they want to achieve their commercial goals.

Understanding the full impact of lubricants – and in turn choosing the right lubricant and having the right total fluid management programme – can help miners turn what they often see as nothing more than a cost and a consumable into a valuable solution that reduces their total cost of operations while delivering significant efficiency and productivity gains.