Virtual Reality Room: a real 3D mining cinema

Initiatives

Virtual Reality Room: a real 3D mining cinema

Special glasses, a dark room and a big screen. It looks like 3D cinema, but in fact, it is our Virtual Reality Room, located in Minas Gerais. A movie playing on the cinema? An overview in 3D about all Vale operations in Brazil. The initiative is a pioneer in the mining industry in the world.

Virtual reality, precise planning

Conceived by employees, since 2011, the technology contributes to making decisions on several aspects of the operations and projects of Vale: from defining the mining area, to the scenarios of environmental licensing and even closing a mining site.

All features can be used for training, testing, analyzing the stages of risk assessment, security action plan, geological, geotechnical and environmental studies, in addition to presenting the interaction of several researches.

How does it work?

The screen has the size of 6 x 4 meters and up to 14 people can interact with projected images by simply moving the hands. In addition to a fixed room, Vale also has a portable virtual reality technology.

But then, how is this possible? Since 2000, Vale has been assembling geographic databases of its fields, by investing on very high resolution images. We do 3D aerial surveys with laser geotechnology and assemble three-dimensional digital models.

Pictures

Partnership with British Geological Survey

The use of virtual reality in mining was inspired by the concepts of the British Geological Survey. Founded in 1835, the British Geological Survey is the oldest geological research center in the world and the UK's leading. In 2013, Vale entered into a partnership with the institution. The goal is to add the British company’s technologies to those used at Vale.

The mining map at the palm of the hand

With tablets, geologists who are in the field can query and update in real time, the information of the study area.