Caterpillar Inc. announced a collaboration with Luck Stone, the nation’s largest family-owned and operated producer of crushed stone, sand and gravel, to deploy Caterpillar’s autonomous solution to Luck Stone’s Bull Run Plant in Chantilly, Virginia. This will be Caterpillar’s first autonomous deployment in the aggregates industry and will expand the company’s autonomous truck fleet to include the 100-ton-class (90-tonne-class) Cat 777.
Looking to accelerate autonomous solutions beyond mining, Caterpillar will implement its existing Cat MineStar Command for Hauling system at the Bull Run quarry, on a fleet of 777G trucks. This will allow Caterpillar to gain greater insights on quarry operations in order to tailor the next generation of autonomous solutions specific to quarry and aggregate applications. This project supports the acceleration of autonomous technology for operations with fewer mobile assets to allow a step change in safety and productivity, as currently experienced at large mining operations.
The current autonomy solutions will be implemented in 2024. This project builds on Caterpillar’s long history in autonomy and automation. Caterpillar is recognized as the industry leader with the world’s largest fleet of autonomous haul trucks, now numbering more than 560 trucks. These trucks have traveled more than 187 million kilometers and autonomously moved more than 5.1 billion tonnes – most notably – all without a single zero lost-time injury.