How machine learning will disrupt mining

We can also apply these algorithms to entire mining operations to help predict and react to different ore types and optimize operations. This concept is essentially an upgrade to geometallurgy: each block of rock within a deposit is tagged with all the information that can affect its economic viability. This should include grade, recovery, hardness, mining recovery/dilution as well as the costs to mine, process and reclaim those blocks. All of these parameters are essential to effectively optimize an operation and enable short- and medium-term planning, but they are difficult to estimate locally. The quality of machine learning predictions is highly dependent on data quality but more so on the quantity and wide distribution of data.