Accurate costing in mixed integer utilisation mining models

Abstract

In this paper, we study the problem of truck and loader equipment selection for surface mines, where we wish to select the best truck and loader fleet for a multi-period mining schedule. In particular, we look at the costing aspect of this problem. The operating cost is known to dominate the overall cost of materials handling over time. When performing equipment selection, we can best account for the operating cost by considering the number of hours that the equipment has been utilised. In a surface mine, equipment is often not utilised to full capacity and not accounting for this difference may lead to inferior solutions. Generally, the cost of operating equipment depends on the age of that..