Increase in Effective Utilization of Haul Trucks in Los Pelambres

摘要

Currently in Minera Los Pelambres, the process of transporting material (mineral and waste) with haul trucks is the bottleneck that impacts material movement of the mine. For this reason, the indicator Effective Utilization in Available Base (UEBD) of transport is one of its most important key process indicators. Through the implementation of Continuous Improvement methodology in this process in 2017, it was possible to identify improvement opportunities that would allow an increase of more than 20 percent points to the effective utilization of haul trucks within a period of 24 months.Improvement potential was mainly found through the reduction of unscheduled delays by 34 % (unplanned detentions), programmed delays (collations and shift changes), operational losses by 59 % (delays in shovels and crushers) and reserves by 11 % (availability of operators and climatic effects). The results obtained by executing the gap closure program, complemented by a weekly strategy of dissemination and Visual Management, enabled to reach and surpass the proposed target 14 months earlier than expected and in a sustainable manner. The success of this improvement has encouraged further implementation of continuous improvement projects, allowing a second gap search phase during 2018 to identify a more ambitious target of 3 percentage points increase in haul truck utilization, expecting a total improvement of 27 % at the end of the year 2019, compared to base performance.