Tech & Caterpillar

Technology has been freeing people from routine factory jobs they don't want to do for a long time (ex: those big red robots building Teslas). We've come a lot further than that now. With vast amounts of data taken from cameras, vehicles can drive themselves.

A mining company has found a perfect use for that technology. Rio Pinto wants very much to mine copper over a mile below the earth's surface in Arizona. It's 175 degrees there and too dangerous to send human beings into that environment to work. 

But Caterpillar Inc. saw an opportunity. Loaders, excavators, other robotic gear have been loaded with thousands of sensors reporting a gazillion data points, and AI analyzes the data. They have a fleet of 275 autonomous mining vehicles that find the ore, get it out, and transport it to the surface - supervised by technicians hundreds of miles away.

Results: their autonomous fleet has hauled 1.9 billion tons for mining companies . . with zero human injuries. These things are big. A tire is twice the size of an SUV.