Mining

Zoomlion Mining machinery business grows 57.2% in first half of 2026. (Image source: Zoomlion)

Zoomlion Heavy Industry Science & Technology Co., Ltd. (Zoomlion) is accelerating the development of its mining equipment portfolio as it expands its international presence

During the first half of 2026, revenue from its mining machinery business increased by more than 57.20% year on year. Meanwhile, international revenue across the company rose 12.45% to RMB 15.535 billion, representing 57.25% of total revenue.

The company is advancing its construction, agricultural and mining equipment operations across three major global machinery markets. Its mining machinery range includes equipment for excavation, loading, transportation, crushing and screening.

Among its key products are the ZE4000G, a mining excavator with a 400-tonne capacity, and the ZTE520 hybrid electric-drive mining truck, which has a rated payload of 300 tonnes.

Zoomlion's experience in mining engineering dates back several decades. In 1987, its predecessor, the Changsha Construction Machinery Research Institute, received a State Council award for developing an integrated open-pit mining system with an annual handling capacity of 10 million tonnes.

The company links the recent expansion of its mining machinery business to efforts to reduce equipment operating costs through product development, practical testing and technological innovation.

Zoomlion designs and refines its machinery around the requirements of operational mining sites. During a previously reported six-month period, its research teams visited approximately 150 mines worldwide, identifying and resolving more than 50 technical challenges. Insights gathered during these visits were subsequently incorporated into product development.

"We calculate operating costs across the full equipment lifecycle so customers can see the economic benefit," said Wu Yuanfeng, deputy general manager of Zoomlion Mining Machinery. "Our pure-electric products can cut costs by more than 50%, and hybrid models can improve profitability by 15% or more, helping mines move toward more efficient, higher-quality operations."

Electrification is another priority within Zoomlion's mining equipment strategy. Its hybrid mining trucks can reduce fuel consumption by up to 40%, while its battery-electric trucks in the 100-tonne class have accumulated more than 8,000 hours of stable operation. The ZT160HEV hybrid mining truck can also support up to 18 hours of continuous autonomous operation.

Alongside electrification, Zoomlion is deploying automation and digital systems to improve operational efficiency. Its technologies include autonomous haulage trucks, remotely operated excavators and fleet coordination systems. According to the company, implementing its system at a major open-pit metal mine in northern China increased the average number of daily trips per truck by more than 10%.

The company's international mining business has expanded into several markets. Electrified machinery has been supplied to coal mines in Indonesia, open-pit mining operations in Argentina, and projects in Ecuador and various African countries.

Zoomlion's broader international operations also recorded growth in the first half of 2026, generating RMB 15.535 billion in revenue, a 12.45% year-on-year increase. Overseas business contributed 57.25% of total revenue, up 1.67 percentage points compared with the same period a year earlier. Growth across South America, Europe, Southeast Asia, Africa and East Asia exceeded the company's overall international growth rate.

To strengthen its overseas presence, Zoomlion is investing in localized manufacturing, distribution and after-sales service. By June 30, 2026, the company had established more than 30 primary business hubs, over 530 secondary and tertiary outlets, and more than 300 spare parts warehouses worldwide. Its aerial work platform factory in Hungary had commenced production, while its German facility had undergone expansion and upgrades to become a multipurpose hub.

"Our overseas front-line operations and back-office teams are now digitally connected, enabling seamless 24-hour coordination," said Liu Jianqiang, Zoomlion's marketing director and deputy general manager of its overseas business.

The combination of mining machinery growth and international expansion is diversifying Zoomlion's revenue base. With mining machinery business growth exceeding 57.20% in the first half of 2026, the company is continuing to develop its equipment portfolio while strengthening its manufacturing, sales and service infrastructure across international markets.

Sibanye-Stillwater advances mechanisation at Siphumelele platinum mine in Rustenburg with Epiroc low-profile equipment. (Image source: Epiroc)

Sibanye-Stillwater is advancing mechanisation at the Siphumelele shaft within its Rustenburg operations, using a fleet of low-profile underground equipment from Epiroc to support platinum mining in narrow-vein conditions

The equipment order includes Epiroc’s LHD 5.5 LP low-profile loader, UV42 utility vehicles and a large range of UV42 cassettes. The fleet is intended to support the ongoing mechanisation project at Siphumelele, with the aim of improving safety and productivity.

The low-profile equipment is designed for mining applications where narrow veins and restricted underground working conditions require compact machinery. The LHD 5.5 LP loader is designed for low-profile loading and hauling, while the UV42 utility vehicles support general underground operations, maintenance and logistics.

“We are proud to support the Siphumelele operation as it starts to use mechanized equipment,” says Helena Hedblom, Epiroc’s President and CEO. “It will strengthen Sibanye-Stillwater’s continuous efforts to be as safe and productive as possible.”

The UV42 vehicles can be fitted with interchangeable cassettes that provide different work decks for a range of underground transportation requirements. These include the movement of personnel, tools and explosives, allowing the same utility vehicle platform to support multiple operational functions.

Richard Cox, Chief Operating Officer, Southern Africa operations at Sibanye-Stillwater, says: “The investment in Siphumelele is an important example of our strategic focus on extending mine life and unlocking additional value from our existing ore reserves. Epiroc's low-profile fleet is well suited to the mining conditions at Siphumelele and will support the safe and efficient execution of this strategically important project.”

The low-profile underground equipment is derived from Epiroc’s acquisition of AARD Mining Equipment in 2023. The acquisition expanded Epiroc’s offering in underground mining, including equipment for critical support and service applications.

For Siphumelele, the equipment forms part of the operation’s broader move towards mechanised mining. Its low-profile design is particularly relevant to underground environments where equipment dimensions need to accommodate narrow-vein mining conditions while supporting loading, logistics, maintenance and other activities.

Delivery of the equipment will begin in the fourth quarter 2026.

Understanding post-closure water quality (Image source: Adobe Stock)

Mine closure is often discussed as something that happens at the end of a mine’s life — in reality, many of the most important closure decisions are made much earlier; while the mine is still being designed, financed, operated, and assessed. Water is one of the clearest examples, writes Shameer Hareeparsad, director: geochemistry, WSP in Africa

Once underground workings begin to flood after closure, groundwater starts interacting with the materials left behind. Those interactions can influence water quality for decades. They may determine whether closure plans are credible, whether regulators have confidence in the proposed management measures, and whether surrounding groundwater systems are protected over the long-term.

For underground mines that use paste backfill, this presents a specific question: how will the backfilled material behave once it is saturated after closure?

Paste backfill has an important role in modern underground mining. It can support excavations, improve ground stability, allow mined-out voids to be filled with mineralised residues, and reduce the amount of tailings placed on surface. These are significant benefits. However, backfill should not only be assessed for how well it can be placed underground or how it performs structurally during operations. It also needs to be understood as a geochemical material that may interact with groundwater once the mine has closed.

Understanding the geochemical source

That requires a different kind of prediction. One of the practical tools used in this kind of prediction is a geochemical source term. It refers to the estimated quality and loading of water that may be released from a material into the receiving environment. Put more simply, it helps answer a practical question: what could this material contribute to groundwater, and under what conditions?

Post-closure water quality must be predicted using the best available evidence, while still recognising the uncertainty involved in modelling systems that will evolve underground over long periods.

Underground nickel mine assessment

In a recent underground nickel mine assessment, the paste aggregate fill included sulphide-bearing tailings, crushed waste rock, process residues, and a slag-based cement binder with an additional binder aid. From a geochemical perspective, this is not an inert blend. The tailings contain sulphide minerals that could generate acidity under certain conditions. At the same time, the binder contributes alkalinity, which can help buffer that acidity once the system becomes saturated.

The question, therefore, was not whether the material was “safe” or “unsafe”. The more relevant question was how the material was likely to behave as groundwater returned to the stopes after mining ceased.

To answer this, the assessment considered two main mechanisms by which solutes could move from the backfill into groundwater. The first is advection, where water movement carries dissolved constituents through pore spaces. The second is diffusion, in which constituents move more slowly due to concentration differences between the backfill and the surrounding water.

During the early flooding period, advective movement can be more significant because hydraulic gradients remain, and more soluble constituents may be flushed from the material. As the system becomes fully saturated and those gradients weaken, diffusion is expected to become more important over the longer term.

Laboratory testing provided the basis for this assessment. Modified triaxial permeability testing was used to estimate advective porewater quality, while the Leaching Environmental Assessment Framework method was used to derive diffusion coefficients. These results were then used to inform groundwater modelling and closure planning.

The results showed a material with low hydraulic conductivity, which limits bulk water movement through the backfill. The long-term porewater chemistry was predicted to remain strongly alkaline and dominated by calcium and chloride. Under those conditions, most metals are expected to remain at low concentrations in solution.

The early flushing period is different. The upper-case scenario, which represents a cautious view of what could happen during initial saturation, showed short-lived increases in certain constituents, including calcium, chloride, sodium, potassium, strontium, and copper. This is important because closure planning must account not only for the eventual stable condition, but also for the transitional period when a flooded underground system is still adjusting.

That does not mean the early-stage results should be treated as a forecast of permanent water quality. In the modelling, those upper-case conditions were deliberately conservative. The assessment applied cautious assumptions, including high mass-transfer rates and the exclusion of some secondary mineral reactions that could reduce dissolved concentrations.

Why conservative modelling matters

This approach is intended to avoid understating the potential loading to groundwater.

That precaution is essential. In mine closure, overconfidence is expensive. If predictions are overly optimistic, the consequences may not become visible for years, when treatment requirements, environmental impacts, or liability concerns are far harder to manage. A conservative model does not remove uncertainty, but it gives project teams, regulators, and other decision-makers a more defensible starting point.

This is also why site-specific testing matters. It is tempting to borrow assumptions from other operations or to rely on generic expectations about how paste backfill should behave. That is seldom good enough. The mineralogy, binder chemistry, groundwater setting, saturation rate, and underground geometry all influence how a backfilled stope may perform after closure.

Why site-specific testing matters

No laboratory programme can perfectly reproduce the underground environment over the course of decades. Temperature, groundwater chemistry, hydraulic gradients, mineral reactivity, and stope-scale flow paths will always introduce uncertainty. But a structured approach can narrow that uncertainty and make it easier to refine predictions as monitoring data becomes available during operations and after mining has ceased.

Planning for uncertainty

The scrutiny around closure plans is also changing. Regulators, financiers, communities, and internal governance teams increasingly expect mining companies to show not only that a closure plan exists, but that it is based on credible evidence and can be adapted as conditions change.

Paste backfill can play an important role in more responsible underground mining and closure design. But its value depends on understanding both its structural and geochemical performance. A material that works well operationally still needs to be assessed for how it may behave once the mine is no longer active and groundwater conditions begin to recover.

Bringing water quality into closure planning

The broader lesson is that post-closure water quality should not be treated as something to discover after flooding has occurred. It should be part of the design conversation from the outset.

Better prediction will not eliminate every closure risk. Mining systems are too complex for that. But it can help the industry make more informed decisions, identify where monitoring is needed, and demonstrate that long-term water protection has been considered before the mine reaches the end of its life.

That is where closure planning needs to move: not towards false certainty, but towards evidence strong enough to support responsible decisions in conditions that will always carry some uncertainty.

Read more:

FLS highlights lifecycle approach to African mining operations

Mine dewatering: integrated pump technology

Rethinking South Africa's wastewater infrastructure

ESB adds its first Liebherr LICCON3 crane. (Image source: Liebherr)

ESB Kranverleih Transport u. Hebetechnik GmbH is continuing to modernise its crane fleet with the addition of a new Liebherr LTM 1055-3.3 equipped with the LICCON3 control system

The 55-tonne mobile crane is the first LICCON3 model in the Biberach-based company's fleet and has been selected to meet the demands of confined construction sites and regional lifting operations.

At the same time, ESB is preparing for its next phase of development with a generational change in its management team. Larissa Maurer, representing the third generation of the family-run business, joined the management team on 1 January 2026.

First LICCON3 crane joins ESB fleet

ESB ordered the three-axle LTM 1055-3.3 at the Bauma trade fair. Its compact dimensions, manoeuvrability and lifting performance made the crane particularly suitable for the company's operating area around Biberach and within a radius of approximately 40 kilometres.

“ In our operating area around Biberach and within a radius of around 40 kilometres, confined construction sites and limited space are daily challenges,” explains Managing Director Karl Engeser Jr. “The three-axle crane is highly manoeuvrable, quick to get to the job site as a ‘taxi crane’ and, thanks to flexible driving modes, offers maximum operational freedom – with or without a permit under Section 29, the road permits required for certain transport configurations in Germany.”

The LTM 1055-3.3 combines a compact three-axle configuration with a boom of approximately 40 metres. This enables the crane to operate effectively on urban construction sites, including applications where access is restricted and lifting operations need to take place around existing structures and obstacles.

Liebherr fleet supports regional lifting operations

The latest acquisition forms part of ESB's ongoing investment in modern lifting equipment. The company currently operates 11 Liebherr mobile cranes with lifting capacities ranging from 35 to 230 tonnes.

“We are regularly investing in our fleet so that we can offer our customers modern, high-performance technology at all times,” says Engeser. “This is the only way we can remain flexible and reliable in meeting a wide variety of requirements.”

ESB also highlighted its relationship with Liebherr and the availability of local service support as factors behind the investment.

“We benefit from the close proximity of Liebherr in Ehingen, the service works well, and we’re seeing a high level of satisfaction with the products in the region.”

The LTM 1055-3.3 entered service at the end of May and has since been used for a range of lifting operations. According to ESB, the new crane has already demonstrated its suitability for narrow access routes and uneven terrain.

“Our new 3-axle crane has been very well received by customers and stands out as a new model with modern design. It has also managed to get through easily so far, even on narrow access routes and uneven terrain,” reports Engeser.

The new 55-tonne crane replaces an older machine as part of ESB's fleet modernisation programme. The company is also planning a further fleet upgrade in the second half of the year, when an existing 130-tonne crane is scheduled to be replaced by a 150-tonne model.

“We will then replace our existing 130-tonne crane with a 150-tonne model and, at the same time, expand our fleet’s capacity range,” says Engesser.

Third generation joins ESB management

Fleet modernisation is being accompanied by a generational transition within the family-owned business. Company founder Karl Engeser Sr. has stepped back from day-to-day operations while continuing to support ESB with his experience and expertise.

Karl Engeser Jr. is responsible for the commercial side of the business, while Larissa Maurer joined the management team on 1 January 2026.

“Carrying on our family-run company into its third generation and helping to shape its future is something I am particularly proud of,” she says happily.

Founded in 1981, ESB Kranverleih Transport u. Hebetechnik GmbH currently employs 11 crane operators in addition to its management team. The company says its lean organisational structure and stable business situation provide a foundation for continued development.

“We have a lean organisational structure and are benefiting from a stable business situation,” reports Larissa Maurer, adding: “We are very satisfied and look to the future with confidence.”