en.Wedoany.com Reported - The Faculty of Physical and Mathematical Sciences (FCFM) of the University of Chile has launched the Batmine project, aimed at studying the degradation of electric vehicle batteries under harsh mining operating conditions to advance underground mining electrification. The project is jointly funded by the French government and the National Copper Corporation of Chile (Codelco), with participants including the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission - Laboratory for Innovation in New Energy Technologies and Nanomaterials (CEA-Liten), the Advanced Mining Technology Center (AMTC) of the University of Chile, and the Center for Accelerating Sustainable Electric Mobility (CASE). Copper and lithium are key materials for manufacturing batteries and electric vehicles, but the mining industry itself faces the challenge of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, according to the Advanced Mining Technology Center (AMTC). Currently, 40% to 50% of direct emissions from mining operations come from diesel-powered equipment, making the transition to electric mobility a priority for the sector.
Dr. Javier Ruiz del Solar, head of the AMTC Mining Autonomous Research Line and co-leader of the project alongside Professor Marcos Orchard, director of the CASE Center, explained that the computational tools developed under the project can analyze, simulate, and optimize different types of operating conditions, various vehicle routes, different mine types, operations, and charging methods. Combining these simulations with actual operational data provided by Codelco and Sandvik, the team generated power curves to characterize the demands that batteries will face during the operation of electric front-end loaders and low-profile electric trucks. These curves were then sent to the CEA-Liten laboratory in France, where experts conduct advanced simulations and accelerated tests on actual batteries to estimate their degradation throughout their service life. The information obtained will help formulate more precise battery replacement strategies, optimize battery usage, and reduce costs associated with operating electric vehicle fleets.
Robin Hervé, CEA-Liten's representative in Chile, believes that the strategic collaboration with AMTC, CASE, and Codelco represents a unique opportunity to apply modeling and advanced testing capabilities to one of the most demanding industrial environments in the world. Combining European expertise in energy storage with actual operational data from Chilean mining will enable high-precision predictions of battery behavior, accelerating the transition to clean, efficient, and sustainable mining operations.
Battery degradation is only part of the challenge. Mine electrification also requires determining how many electric vehicles to use, where to install charging infrastructure, when to charge them, and how to coordinate the entire operation to maintain 24-hour production. The "Electric Mobility for Large-Scale Underground Mining" project, led by Dr. Javier Ruiz del Solar and involving scholars such as Angela Flores, Luis Felipe Orellana, and Marcos Orchard, has developed the ELMOMine tool to simulate the operation of electric vehicle fleets before field implementation. This tool integrates information on mine layout, production plans, electrical infrastructure, battery characteristics, and equipment operational behavior. In ELMOMine simulations, users can view statistics and indicators for a shift, a day, or even a month, analyzing equipment and production behavior under different operational scenarios. The platform also optimizes routes, plans charging times, compares different battery technologies, and estimates metrics such as productivity, energy consumption, and operational costs before making field investments.
In Chile, mining accounts for approximately 15% of the country's greenhouse gas emissions. The Batmine and ELMOMine projects aim to provide practical tools to advance toward carbon neutrality. Through these initiatives, the AMTC and CASE centers conduct applied research to accelerate the adoption of electric mobility in the mining industry, optimize energy use, and contribute to reducing greenhouse gas emissions in this sector, which is critical to the global energy transition.
