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Autonomous Dump Trucks Are Coming To Canada's Oil Sands

Posted by Soulskill on from the let's-teach-the-machines-to-devour-our-planet dept.

Daniel_Stuckey writes "According to a Bloomberg report, Canadian oil sands giant Suncor, which is "Canada's largest energy company by market value," is currently testing haul trucks that are run by computers. Extracting bitumen from sands requires first digging up an enormous amount of the sand itself, with about two tons of sands required to produce one barrel of oil. Digging up all of that sand is the job of huge excavators, which then offload into gigantic haul trucks that transport sands to extraction plants. Time is money, and in this case being faster means carrying as much sand as possible. Haul trucks can carry hundreds of tons at a time, and are in constant motion, moving back and forth between excavator and extraction plant."

4 of 165 comments (clear)

  1. Will they run Windows? by bob_super · · Score: 4, Funny

    I'm looking forward to the remake of "Christine" with a truck the size of a house in the title role.

    1. Re:Will they run Windows? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Will they run Windows?

      Not without updated drivers.

  2. So God ... by Bodhammer · · Score: 3, Funny

    So God put the sand in the Vaseline?

    --
    "I say we take off, nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."
  3. Re:Oil Sands by snowraver1 · · Score: 3, Funny

    Careful now... last time you declared war on Canada, your White House was burned to the ground.

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