698
For the public technologies in the IoT for mines, there are still many problems that need
to be solved (Colakovic & Hadzialic, 2018). In particular, there are not enough research on
the standards that can be used to promote the development of the IoT for mines. The overall
situation should be considered from different aspects, e.g. the description of the thing and
the interoperability. Moreover, we need to work on a series of mine standards for the IoT.
3.3 The strategic goals of IoT for mines
There are several strategic goals of IoT for mines. Firstly, the new sensors and intelligent
things of mining will rapidly grow to form a semantic Web in around a decade of development. Secondly, the cloud computing and big data for the mines are widely used to form
the “cloud” or “fog” computing service platform. Thirdly, the new service system and the
value chain gradually improve and the sustainable mining ecological environment is initially
formed. The core contents of the strategic goals are to construct the semantic mine and
develop the mine service platform, and make the mine development sustainable.
There are a large number of objects in the mine environment. These objects and production
processes continually generate a large number of events. Using the IoT technologies to interconnect these things helps them work together to create the new applications and services. Through
the application of new sensors, distributed measurement and energy harvesting technology, the
mine monitoring and control without blind zone can be realized. Through the technologies such
as ubiquitous sensing, the software defined network and post-disaster reconstruction of network, we can achieve the seamless connection between the objects in the mines. With a priori
model and the expert knowledge, we can achieve that the technology of IoT for mines evolves
from the sensing to the context awareness. The mine production process gradually becomes
transparent.
We aim to achieve the semantic expression, information fusion, knowledge mining and
semantic description of the mine through the unified IoT platform, cloud computing service
and big data technology. In this way, the information will be effectively used. In particular, we
can empower the system with the capability of early safety warning and the virtual reproduction of events. Thus, we can significantly improve the efficiency of mine production and safety
level. Meanwhile, through the construction of IoT for mines, an open and networked platform
for the applications will be formed to provide the mines with the professional services.
3.4 The key development areas of IoT for mines
In view of the strategic goals of IoT for mines, we need to make breakthroughs in the key
technologies, and provide the perception services, and build the “cloud” and “fog” platforms
to promote the work on the standardization.
3.4.1 Key technologies
The key technologies include developing miniaturized intelligent devices, clarifying the
detailed rules of radio wave propagation in the mine roadway, exploring the construction
strategy of cloud computing platform and big data platform, working on the semantics
(Aguilar et al. 2018), studying the security mechanism and the strategy of privacy protection
and constructing a reliable network.
3.4.2 Perception services
The perception services of IoT for mines will focus on four aspects, i.e. “human, machine,
environment and management”.
1. The human perception. The IoT for mines needs to provide the context-aware service for
the people. The safety of the people is the most important aspect in the mine production
process. The surveillance system needs to be developed for the workers’ localization, the
activity recognition and intelligent decision-making.
2. The equipment perception. The status of the equipments needs to be monitored in real-time.
For the public technologies in the IoT for mines, there are still many problems that need
to be solved (Colakovic & Hadzialic, 2018). In particular, there are not enough research on
the standards that can be used to promote the development of the IoT for mines. The overall
situation should be considered from different aspects, e.g. the description of the thing and
the interoperability. Moreover, we need to work on a series of mine standards for the IoT.
3.3 The strategic goals of IoT for mines
There are several strategic goals of IoT for mines. Firstly, the new sensors and intelligent
things of mining will rapidly grow to form a semantic Web in around a decade of development. Secondly, the cloud computing and big data for the mines are widely used to form
the “cloud” or “fog” computing service platform. Thirdly, the new service system and the
value chain gradually improve and the sustainable mining ecological environment is initially
formed. The core contents of the strategic goals are to construct the semantic mine and
develop the mine service platform, and make the mine development sustainable.
There are a large number of objects in the mine environment. These objects and production
processes continually generate a large number of events. Using the IoT technologies to interconnect these things helps them work together to create the new applications and services. Through
the application of new sensors, distributed measurement and energy harvesting technology, the
mine monitoring and control without blind zone can be realized. Through the technologies such
as ubiquitous sensing, the software defined network and post-disaster reconstruction of network, we can achieve the seamless connection between the objects in the mines. With a priori
model and the expert knowledge, we can achieve that the technology of IoT for mines evolves
from the sensing to the context awareness. The mine production process gradually becomes
transparent.
We aim to achieve the semantic expression, information fusion, knowledge mining and
semantic description of the mine through the unified IoT platform, cloud computing service
and big data technology. In this way, the information will be effectively used. In particular, we
can empower the system with the capability of early safety warning and the virtual reproduction of events. Thus, we can significantly improve the efficiency of mine production and safety
level. Meanwhile, through the construction of IoT for mines, an open and networked platform
for the applications will be formed to provide the mines with the professional services.
3.4 The key development areas of IoT for mines
In view of the strategic goals of IoT for mines, we need to make breakthroughs in the key
technologies, and provide the perception services, and build the “cloud” and “fog” platforms
to promote the work on the standardization.
3.4.1 Key technologies
The key technologies include developing miniaturized intelligent devices, clarifying the
detailed rules of radio wave propagation in the mine roadway, exploring the construction
strategy of cloud computing platform and big data platform, working on the semantics
(Aguilar et al. 2018), studying the security mechanism and the strategy of privacy protection
and constructing a reliable network.
3.4.2 Perception services
The perception services of IoT for mines will focus on four aspects, i.e. “human, machine,
environment and management”.
1. The human perception. The IoT for mines needs to provide the context-aware service for
the people. The safety of the people is the most important aspect in the mine production
process. The surveillance system needs to be developed for the workers’ localization, the
activity recognition and intelligent decision-making.
2. The equipment perception. The status of the equipments needs to be monitored in real-time.