Opencast mining lives and dies by accurate ground models. Survey House establishes the survey programme from the very start: capturing the greenfield (original) topography before any work begins, setting out the ground control the operation will reference, and recording the Original Ground Level (OGL) that everything is measured against.
As mining advances, successive surveys are compared against OGL to quantify what has been moved, measure progress and reconcile volumes for planning and payment — the heart of opencast reconciliation. Pit, bench and dump surveys, stockpile volumetrics, haul-road and infrastructure set-out, and drill-and-blast control all sit within the programme.
The work is delivered with whichever method best fits the site — GNSS control, aerial/UAV capture and 3D laser scanning — and increasingly from a safe standoff: scanning a pit edge or stockpile removes the old hazard of a surveyor working close to the edge, and is both quicker and more accurate.
It is a sector built from our GNSS, aerial and volumetric disciplines, delivered as one coordinated surface-mine programme.
Surfaces are captured by GNSS, total station, aerial capture or laser scanning depending on pit size, access and required accuracy, then compared against a previous surface or against design to derive volume.
The measurement is usually not where reconciliation disputes originate. Survey volume is a geometric quantity; declared tonnage depends on bulk density, moisture and material assumptions.
Volume accuracy depends on surface capture density, the accuracy of the previous surface, and how well the material boundary is defined.
