The type of shovel a mine chooses depends on mine life and volume of material to be moved.
Hydraulic shovel advantages are:
- Highly mobile making the shovel easy to move for normal operations
- No costly infrastructure needed to electrify the mine to power the electric shovels. Stringing high voltage power lines is expensive and because the mines are usually very remote
- The lead times to deliver are shorter than an electric shovel
- Lower purchase price
Electric shovel advantages are:
- Longer mine life
- Lower operating cost compared to a diesel powered hydraulic
- Very high productivity at a low cost per ton
- Large size optimizing economies of scale
