Introduction to Automation Systems Requirements

Dr David Dekker discussed the importance of a multidisciplinary approach to automation, the infrastructure required to support automation, and selecting the equipment for automation. Dekker stressed that automation involves a number of technologies. The mining industry is currently about part-way through the evolutionary process of achieving a fully integrated automation system. He pointed out that the final stages require parallel development of infrastructure such as mine communications. Technologies required for automation Automation systems consist of three parts: the gathering of information, the processing of that information, and taking action.