In the book, The mind of a fox: Scenario Planning in Action, authors Clem Sunter and Chantell Ilbury, stress the importance of planners to think like a fox. Alert, keen and sensitive to their environment, foxes are agile and highly responsive to change. Sunter and Ilbury contrast the fox with a hedgehog, who only sees a single version of the future and plans accordingly!
For many years, long-range planners utilized tools to perform conceptual-level strategic plans. The goal was to quickly evaluate the best strategies for the business. Mine planners understand that the scheduling and resulting NPV from such scenarios are only partially achievable due to operational reasons not considered at this stage. Further validation of the plans is required. This is where detailed strategic scheduling comes into play.
To reduce risk, an additional level of detail is required to understand how the first years will translate when broken into monthly or quarterly schedules: Where are we excavating? How is the material routed from the source to the dumping destination? What is the value of the plan? The goal is to elicit as much value from the conceptual schedule by capturing more detail from a set of operational constraints not considered at the earlier stages.
Mine planning teams turn to MinePlan Schedule Optimizer to uncover this level of detail and capture project value. MinePlan Schedule Optimizer can complement strategic plans to determine the most productive cut mining sequence, achieve the highest project profitability and generate practical project schedules. It features multi-horizon scheduling, integrated haulage database and equipment constraints, and mixed integer linear programming (MILP) for schedule optimization.
Using MinePlan Schedule Optimizer, you can optimize your schedule and haulage simultaneously. Native integration with the 3D viewer delivers instant feedback after schedules are generated. Expect minimized variance between plan vs. actual and lower operational expenditures and capital expenditures. Generate schedules faster, meet operational constraints, maximize recoveries, and reduce penalties.
Hexagon’s global team of technical specialists is ready to collaborate with mining companies and provide optimized schedules for every scenario.
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