Roughly nine months after reaching the four-billion-tonne autonomously hauled milestone, trucks equipped with Cat MineStar Command for hauling have now moved over five billion tonnes, Caterpillar has revealed.

Currently, more than 550 mining trucks are equipped with Command for hauling, operating across three continents. According to the company, Cat autonomous trucks are on pace to eclipse previous record totals of materials hauled in a calendar year, projected to be more than 1.4bn tonnes in 2022.

In May 2022, Caterpillar launched three new compact wheeled loaders.

“In 2013, we placed our first fleets of autonomous trucks in Western Australia at FMG Solomon and BHP Jimblebar. Since that time, trucks using Command for hauling have safely traveled nearly 200m km, more than twice the experience in autonomous operations of any automobile manufacturer,” said Denise Johnson, Group President of Caterpillar Resource Industries in a statement.

She added, “Caterpillar has grown the number of autonomous trucks in operation by 40% in the past two years. We believe that automation is one of many keys to implement technology that unlocks the value miners need when it comes to the energy transition toward more sustainable operations.”

In June 2022, Komatsu said it would expand its autonomous technology on haul trucks by 2024.

Speaking about the latest Cat autonomous trucks to be deployed, Marc Cameron, VP of Caterpillar Resource Industries added, “The new Cat 798 AC electric drive trucks replacing BHP’s entire haul truck fleet at the Escondida mine [in Chile] will feature technologies that advance the site’s key initiatives, including autonomy and decarbonisation. The agreement allows Escondida | BHP to accelerate the implementation of its autonomy plans by transitioning the fleet with autonomous haulage system (AHS) technology.”

In early September 2022, Caterpillar inked a deal to replace the haul truck fleet at a Chilean mine.