Search Documents

By A G. L Pratt

Operational readiness is a commonly used term in mining and many other industry settings. However, translating this term into a coherent scope of work that is practical and meaningful is a challenge faced by many mining projects. This inhibits the allocation of resources to the work and its completion. The problem is with understanding how the terminology applies to establishing a mining operation. Resolving this problem requires clarity around what operational readiness means for a mining project’s transition to operations and who owns the tasks of completing operational readiness. The motivation for resolution of this problem is in appreciating the consequences arising from any lack of clarity in definition of this task, the timing of the work, and ownership for its completion. In broad terms, these consequences amount to an erosion of value at a critical time for both the new mine and the company and shareholders. This situation often arises where operational readiness is not adequately addressed in project’s study phases. As a result, neither time, resources nor money are adequately provided to complete the work required. In other cases, operational readiness is sometimes assimilated with the delivery of the project’s physical assets by the project’s construction team, rather than aligned with the establishment of the operating team to deliver the desired operational outputs. This paper argues that operational readiness starts in a project’s study phases and flows through into the start of operations. The definition of operational readiness is discussed as a task, and a model for its planning and completion is presented. This discussion includes assigning ownership for operational readiness planning and delivery to the General Manager of a new operation and the operations leadership team, who are central to the success of this work. After all, the reputations of this leadership team depend on the performance of the operation in its first few years. The author’s work over the last 20 years, leading operational readiness programs and the preparation of feasibility studies for mining projects, has provided the insights and evolution of ideas that are central to this paper. Operational readiness is fundamentally directed at ensuring a new mining operation gets away to a successful start and builds a solid foundation for the future of the mine/operation/province. It requires clarity of purpose, ownership and coordination by people in the operating team, and their preparation of the requisite process definition and establishment of the significant relationships required for operations. Without its successful completion, it is unlikely the new operation will meet and sustain its start-up targets. This paper discusses a practical approach to operational readiness for mining projects.

Mar 29, 2023

Shortly after Denny, Robson, and Irwin published their first paper in 1937, on the prevention of silicosis by metallic aluminium, experiments were begun on the practical application of the discovery.It was thought at that time that aluminium powder, to be effective in aluminium therapy, would have to be intimately admixed with siliceous dust at the latter's source. There followed several years of experimental work underground, during which the application of aluminium powder was tested in:(1) Speakers on machine columns, vibrated by drills.(2) Vials placed in drill holes to be blasted.(3) Both homogeneous and heterogeneous mixture with explosives.(4) Packages with tamping.(5) Compressed-air lines.(6) Special compressed-air ejectors for use while drilling and after blasting.(7) The discharge of ventilation fans.(8) The filters of respirators.It was concluded from this research that any adequate method of introducing aluminium powder into a mine atmosphere would require too much extra gear, supervision, and aluminium p;wder, and would interfere unduly with underground routine.Later, animal experiments by Denny, Robson, and Irwin2 showed that aluminium powder provided effective therapy when inhaled independent of silica dust. Therefore, some means of surface treatment was deemed more practical.APPARATUS USED IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF ALUMINIUM PROPHYLAXIS SAMPLINGA basic requirement was a method of sampling to assess accurately the particle-size concentrations of dispersed aluminium powder. Konimetry, though regularly practised at McIrityre, was inadequate for the research in mind. On the other hand, the efficiency of the thermal precipitator was recognized as being very high. Accordingly, the latter instrument was chosen as best suited to our needs. Through the courtesy of the Ontario...

Jan 1, 1945

Classification within the Inferred Resource category is based on geological judgement and the balance of extrapolation versus interpolation that the Competent Person is prepared to accept. These resources are typically drilled at spacings well in excess of the geostatistical range and at a density that is non-uniform. In many cases, a substantial proportion of the available data will be historical, and should be considered with more recent data sources. The provision of a robust geological model will increase the confidence in any resource estimate, and should be viewed as a critical component. The definition of Inferred Resources is of great importance to vein gold projects, since Indicated and Measured Resources generally require costly underground development for delineation. Indeed, many gold vein operations possess substantial quantities of Inferred Resources (>75 per cent) in their resource inventory both at project start-up and during production. This contribution explores a number of the key issues when using the Inferred Resource category and presents four recent case studies.

Jan 1, 2006

By Bowra N

Working capital is best described as money that must be supplied from a company's treasury to buy inventories for raw materials and finished products and to provide credit to customers who have not yet paid for delivered products. Working Capital requirements for resource projects are to a large extent, dependent on specific characteristics of the projects concerned. Important variables are the nature of the project and speed with which sales can be realised. The project's location is also important as this will influence inventory levels. Working capital requirements have a time profile, the present value of which can represent a significant portion of a projects overall capital needs. A significant component of a project's working capital is not readily recoverable or able to be reassigned should the project fail or be deferred.

Jan 1, 1986

By C Jones

When the Paulsens operation was poised to be placed on care and maintenance, Bill Beament and the rest of the Northern Star Resources (NSR) team capitalised on the opportunity to send the Ashburton region’s only operating gold mine into the record books.A three-stage strategy was devised by NSR to pay off the acquisition and maximise the return from the operation. The first stage was to mine the 55 000 oz mine plan and pay off the cost of the acquisition, then maintain profitable production beyond the seven months and re-establish a mine life. The second stage involved an early commitment to a 220 m long diamond drill drive being placed in the hanging wall of the orebody from which the extensions of the orebody could be further explored, allowing the second stage of the plan to come into effect and extend the mine life by converting Inferred Resources into the mine plan. The third stage of the initial plan was to utilise this drill drive and continue to drill deeper holes beyond the current limit of drilling in the ore zones to extend the orebody and increase the mine’s life.With an ever growing desire to further expand, the young company took on the bold move of establishing its own mining services division. A critical element to the success of this was ensuring that the right people were recruited with the appropriate specialised skill sets.Aligning common goals amongst all NSR team members, from the board and senior management to the work force on site, was critical to integrate the new and driven direction that Paulsens had adopted. It was essential to change the focus and a shift in all employees’ attitudes and values from a mine that was all but down and out, to a site that wanted to be kicking some serious goals.Teaming together a passionate and driven leader with a strong allied workforce was always going to put NSR in the best position possible to make Paulsens the success story that it now is. But without the calculated risks and enthusiastic attitude, the little known mine site in the Pilbara might have remained just that.CITATION:Jones, C, 2014. The Paulsens transformation – a shining light under a northern star, in Proceedings 12th AusIMM Underground Operators’ Conference 2014 , pp 191–196 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Mar 24, 2014

By R Razanatsimba, A Galli

A mining company has entered into contractual commitments to supply certain quantities of its product to clients in each time period. Failure to fulfil its obligations would damage its reputation as a reliable supplier. The planned production would normally be sufficient unless major problems such as highwall failures, roof falls, natural disaster, or strikes that interrupt production or delays in obtaining environmental permits, occur. To overcome these difficulties, the company may be able to obtain more of the commodity: from its strategic stockpile (if there is sufficient there); by buying it on the spot market; or for some commodities such as gold and uranium, by leasing it. Two sources of uncertainty, the spot price of the commodity and the occurrence of serious incidents that interrupt production, are considered. For simplicity it is assumed that the commodity price follows a geometric Brownian motion, that productions incidents have a binomial distribution, that they are independent from one time period to another and that they do not affect prices. A branching tree structure is used to model the joint evolution of prices and production incidents. The aim of this research project was to evaluate the companyÆs options for fulfilling its contractual commitments. When evaluating these options, multi-stage stochastic programming with recourse was used to solve this problem because in addition to providing the dollar value of the project, it gives decision-makers the æroadmapÆ to reach the optimal value. That is, how much material should be bought/sold on the spot market, how much to add to/subtract from the stockpile, how much to lease and in the worst case what the shortfall would be, for each time period as a function of the current spot price and breakdown status. A case-study over a five-year period is used to illustrate the proposed procedure. In this study the production would be sufficient to cover the companyÆs contractual commitments unless production incidents occur. Focus is on evaluating the impact of the quantity initially in the stockpile on the value of the project when the commodity market is tight, that is, when only small quantities can be bought on the spot market or by leasing.

Sep 26, 2011

By O Bascur, A Soudek

Large metallurgical complexes are substantial users of energy, water and assets. To improve the effectiveness of energy and assets the quality of the data and events become paramount for real-time operational management. A lack of resources at the local operations and at the enterprise makes it impossible to process the sea of information and many projects have failed. As such, a novel approach for implementation of continuous improvements at the local level and innovations at the strategic level was implemented at all operating plants at Anglo American Platinum. Sixteen concentrators, three smelters and two refinery process systems were integrated to scale the information for manufacturing services at the local and enterprise level. The new capability of an enterprise real-time monitoring and diagnosis software infrastructure was available to implement many business strategies in tandem. Mineral and metallurgical processing knowledge is used to simplify the implementation of the data model. As such, asset monitoring, energy, production and process control management were implemented in an integrated approach reusing the same data but with different context and time horizons to have a standard methodology for local root cause analysis. This paper will highlight a sustainability management approach to change and empower the local and strategic team to collaborate using a new approach for adaptive reporting and condition-based event management and notifications. The results based on the integrated and collaborative team efforts will be presented. OSIsoft Plant Information system was installed and configured to achieve a targeted reduction in energy consumption of 15 per cent by 2015.CITATION:Bascur, O and Soudek, A, 2014. Implementation strategies for energy effectiveness and sustainability – example of Anglo American Platinum, in Proceedings 12th AusIMM Mill Operators’ Conference 2014 , pp 101–108 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Sep 1, 2014

By A D. Stewart Gillies

Resource rent taxes are taxes which only become effective at such a time as a pre-determined rate of return has been achieved by an operation. Resource Rent Taxes have from time to time been considered for implementation in bothAustralia and New Zealand. The offshore petroleum industry in Australia is already subject to RRT as is the Roxby Downs (Olympic Dam) Mine in South Australia. Both the mining and petroleum taxation regimes in Papua New Guinea include a resource rent tax component called Additional Profits Tax.   The implications of the current form of additional profits tax for shareholder cash returns are that the tax burden on the operation may suddenly increase at some stage in the life of the mine if and when the threshold level of profitability for the tax to be triggered is exceeded. From that point in time onwards the cash return to the shareholders on the capital invested is greatly diminished. For mining companies in Papua New Guinea, the effective tax rate increases from 35% to 57.75% as a result of the onset of additional profits tax. This tax rate penalty is so severe that there appears to be merit in considering the concept of managing profitability through time rather than purely maximising annual pre-tax profits as is currently the case in most mining operations. This would have the benefit of deferring or perhaps preventing altogether the onset of the tax. One possible method for the effective management of profitability is through the control of average mining grade by cutoff grade manipulation.   Traditional cutoff grade theory has usually considered taxation as a direct cost at a fixed or variable percentage of annual profits. As a result of this most analyses are conducted on a pre-tax basis. If tax is included in analyses it is usually present as a time independent function of gross profit. Additional profits tax is both time, and rate of return dependent and therefore not adequately accommodated by currently accepted cutoff grade theory.   A review has been made of the effects of resource rent taxes on both the investment decision-making process as well as possible development and mining strategies which may be employed by mining companies faced with resource rent taxes. The review includes examples based on the structure of additional profits tax which is levied in Papua New Guinea.

Jan 1, 1995

Energy Savings and Technology Comparison Using Small Grinding Media Considering the complexity of minerals, the need for finer grinding is increasing along with the energy cost. However, energy is increasing exponentially when grinding finer with conventional grinding balls. The use of small grinding media represents the best potential to improve energy efficiency. Today, it is possible to use grinding media as small as 1 mm. How do they perform in industrial grinding mills? The use of small grinding media (5 - 12 mm), called Millpebs, in regrind mills proved that finer grinding can be achieved at lower energy consumption. In ball mills, energy savings vary from 10 per cent to 40 per cent compared to 25 mm media. A regrind ball mill with a mix of small grinding media can be as energy efficient as an Isa Mill charged with 2.5 and 3.5 mm beads. In vertical stirred mills, energy savings vary from 30 per cent to 60 per cent. To carry out the same final grind, a vertical stirred mill with Millpebs will consume at least 60 per cent less energy than a ball mill using 25 mm grinding media. More potential savings were identified. To achieve those improvements, some operating conditions must be met: 1) feed size should be less than 250 ¦m; 2) the pulp must be fluid enough; 3) finally, the slurry linear velocity should not be excessive. This paper talks about all those industrial results improvement and operating conditions.

Sep 13, 2010

By T Goldsmith

The mining industry is cyclical, but those are more than normal business cycles. In the early 2000s the industry saw the start of China as a game changer for the mining industry which lead to catch phrases like ‘stronger for longer’ and even ‘stronger forever’. Enter the global financial crises and the more recent slow-down in the Chinese economy and confidence that the future is bright has dimmed! This paper looks at the long-term forces that are likely to impact the global mining sector and explain why the industry has an excellent future. However, the industry is not without its many challenges and while demand may be in a prolonged step change, the ability to generate profits will depend on the fitness of each asset and company.The author also discusses the hated terms of ‘boom’ and ‘bust’ and considers how the industry can reduce them, but normally exacerbates them. The ability of the junior sector to raise funds being a primary example and one that remains closed to all but the very best exploration assets. There is also consideration of Australia’s position as a mining country in the future world.CITATION:Goldsmith, T, 2014. The future of the global mining sector, in Proceedings Ninth International Mining Geology Conference 2014 , pp 15–20 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Aug 18, 2014

This paper talks about the experiences of groups we have worked with over the last few years in the Asia-Pacific region (Australia, Canada, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea) and the ways that they have worked to bridge the divide between traditional and introduced structures, governance at a regional level and the introduction of traditional values into monitoring and evaluation practices. In doing this these groups have created structures and processes which have helped them engage both more effectively with external stakeholders while maintaining the legitimacy of their own operations with their own constituents. These are important ideas for those involved in the mining industry that could provide a number of very tangible benefits to mining firms and their engagement with these kinds of groups.

Jan 1, 2009

Project-finance risk assessment is mature and approached systematically. Mining industry due diligence remains fragmented with specialists addressing different aspects of the project such as reserves/JORC, environmental impact, commodity market, even financial analysis/ modelling. Each professional has a natural tendency to believe that the risk factors they have examined are the key ones necessary to be reviewed, as if their review will stand in isolation from others in the way a project materialises. By first laying out the project risk categories and risk matrices, this paper examines the due diligence process with a keen eye to the risk assessment and overlap/interaction. Some cross fertilisation of due diligence techniques from other industry sectors is placed into the mining context. Six case studies are then presented with regards to due diligence features in each projectÆs feasibility review or financial information/ offering memorandum. A power case first shows the differences between the due diligence expectations of banks versus bond financings. Then some Australian and Indonesian mining development cases are analysed to see the due diligence learning points. Some of these were project/due diligence failures. The conclusion focuses on the value of a systematic risk assessment for project evaluation, all from the project-finance perspective.

Jan 1, 2007

This paper describes the development of an approach to sustainable development for application at the feasibility study stage for a proposed bauxite mine near the community of Aurukun, south of Weipa on the western coast of Cape York Peninsula, Queensland, Australia. The general environment for development was complex in all dimensions. In particular, the socio-demographic profile of the Aurukun community (population 1200) characterised it as being amongst the most disadvantaged communities in Australia. The traditional owners of the area, the Wik and Wik-Way people, were at the forefront in the efforts of Indigenous people in Australia to secure land rights over the past 30 years, and they had previous experience negotiating an Indigenous Land Use Agreement (the Western Cape Communities Coexistence Agreement) with Rio Tinto Alcan, the operators of the Weipa bauxite mine. Through this they had shown a well-founded sense of entitlement with respect to the development of resources on their traditional land. The Queensland State Government had recently cancelled an existing mining lease over the bauxite resource as the holder of the tenement had not fulfilled the terms of a development agreement that had been in place for 30 years. The Government was anxious to avoid any future æbankingÆ of the resource, and had decided to offer tenure to the resource on an international competitive basis, subject to the requirements of the Commonwealth Native Title Act 1993. This would require a negotiation process with traditional owners and potentially involve companies with whom the traditional owners had no existing relationship (typically developed during the projectÆs exploration phase) and who possibly had no project development experience in Australia. As well, the State Government envisaged an approach to development that drew on the significant work that industry and other stakeholders had undertaken over the previous ten to 15 years, commencing with the mining, minerals and sustainable development (MMSD) process. This work was aimed at rectifying acknowledged deficiencies with industry recognition of stakeholder interests, in particular with respect to environmental management and socioeconomic development. The approach adopted aimed to define the strategic community interests and sustainable development outcomes to which the development of the resource would be expected to contribute, and to embody these within an easily usable management structure that could be applied to each stage of project development from feasibility study through to mine closure. The logical framework (AusAID, 2006; ICMM, 2005) was the management tool utilised to order the identified interests and desired outcomes. The structure included components aligned with the key areas of development interest expressed by the community, and the initial baseline sustainable development plan (SDP) developed established component objectives, outcomes, indicative outputs and activities for the feasibility stage of the project. This established an objective framework to guide potential bidders when developing their response to the State GovernmentÆs Request for Proposal. The paper will describe the evolution of the competitive process and the parallel process for development of the SDP. While the institutional environment was politically and socially complex, the use of simple visual representations of the environment and the analysis and ordering of issues, objectives and criteria through methods such as stakeholder analysis and the logical framework approach, enable the development of a dialogue on the contribution that the development of a mining project can make to sustainable community development, and for the development of an agreed program of community support to capture the contribution. The use of the logical framework was found to have good functionality for plan development. Achieving plan outcomes though, is highly dependent on the skill of key project personnel in facilitation, team building, conflict resolution and leadership, as well as their ability to influence the behaviour of key stakeholders with the capacity and authority to require the integration of local economic development criteria in to key project development decisions.

Jan 1, 2009

By B P. Micke

Central Norseman Gold Corporation was established in 1935 and has been mining on the Norseman field in Western Australia since then. It is Australia’s longest continuously operating gold mining operation at nearly 80 years, although it has had its periodic challenges in the intervening years.Over the last 40 years, a series of open pit mines around the Dundas Goldfield have supplied lower cost mill feed to the Phoenix Mill at Norseman from time to time but this has largely come to an end for the foreseeable future. Now that underground ore sources are once again the principal mill feed, there are several challenges to be met for an ongoing profitable operation.During the last 20 years, there have been three different owners and this has affected the manner in which the operations were managed quite significantly. These differing approaches are contrasted and examined in some detail from both the operational and financial aspects.Planning of a downsized operation to ensure sustainable profitability in the future in a mining environment where there has rarely been more than two to four years of reserves ahead of the mill for planning purposes has been a significant challenge. Several of the options examined are described, including alternatives for future mine development.CITATION:Micke, B P, 2014. Managing the margin at Norseman, Western Australia – a case study, in Proceedings 12th AusIMM Underground Operators’ Conference 2014 , pp 119–128 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Mar 24, 2014

THE following short paper on the Blair Athol coal-field will no doubt have a twofold interest to members from the fact that its main seam, known as the "Big Seam" of a maximum thickness of 91 ft without a band, is unique, being probably the thickestseam of high-grade clean coal yet known, and also because of the interesting problem it presents the colliery engineer-viz., which system of mining is the best to secure the highest economical extraction.Location - Blair Athol is a mining township in Central Queensland, situated at an altitude of about 1100 ft. above sea-level at the end of a branch railway line 74, miles from Emerald, on the Main Central Western line, and 240 miles by rail from Rockhampton.Geology - The coal-measures appear to lie in a shallow basin of about four or five square miles in area, surrounded on all sides by slates and schists, which are overlaid oh three sides by alluvial deposits of up to 150 ft. in thickness, and on the fourth by a thick basalt bed, as yet unproved, some miles beyond which the auriferous slates outcrop. These alluvial deposits have been largely worked in years past and gave high gold returns, the chief diggings being Clermont and Macdonald's Flats in the south, the Springs and Black Ridge in the north-east, and Yankee Creek and others on the west. The surface of the coal-fields may be described as unbroken, but undulating, with gentle southerly dip, the watercourses opening out into wide flats. The absence of creeks or deep gullies accounts for no outcrops being visible on the surface, and the coal-measures...

Jan 1, 1918

In blasting large tonnages of ore or material, the economy of the operation 'depends mainly on the mine manager's judgment in placing the holes to the best possible advantage and in determining the most effective size of hole to suit the conditions and requirements.The placing of holes is often looked upon as a problem involving so many uncertain factors that the application of simple mathematics is impossible. The uncertain factors arise when dealing with strata of different character, in hardness toughness and resistance to shearing.A study of the practice at many mines where all types of strata from hard ore to relatively soft overburden, and even coal, is being mined, suggests that the problem is not as complex as generally believed. There is, without doubt, some uniformity in the amount of burden given to holes of equivalent dimensions, regardless of the material being mined. The reason is simple. With too great a burden hard rock will not break out and soft rock will "bull". The nature of the strata is taken care of by the strength, quantity and distribution of the explosive charge and, to some extent, the spacing of the holes.It is because burdens are uniform in all classes of strata met with in mining, that a formula can be used to design blast hole layouts.The formula introduced in this paper is empirical as it is based on prevailing practice. It has been tested and proved remarkably accurate against every example available to the writer. Many thousands of blast holes, at many different mines, are represented by the examples given in the attached tables; to give further examples would only mean, unnecessary repetition. At the Mount Morgan Mine...

Jan 1, 1952

Both here and in Australia, the unique commercial and tax features of joint venture are finding favour in forestry, fishing, technology and infrastructure projects. For New Zealand mining companies, joint ventures provide a means of access to foreign know how and investment funds, while retaining their corporate independence and their hard-earned tax losses.   This paper discusses some of the practical income tax and GST considerations where a joint venture structure is contemplated. The first part of the paper considers income tax, and in particular how joint ventures enable companies to access and carry forward tax losses. It explains why a joint venture may be advantageous relative to a jointly owned company.   The second part of the paper concerns GST and the focus is on two aspects: 1.   Joint ventures may be registered for GST. In some instances they have no choice and are required to do so. Where a joint venture is registered in respect of a taxable activity, the members are not permitted to register in respect of the same activity. This may be problem where the member has incurred its own expenses and the member wishes to register in its own right to claim back the GST on those expenses. This paper explores the issue and possible solutions. 2.   It is not uncommon to see joint ventures claiming GST on the costs of production, and the production being sold (and GST is being charged) by the members. In this paper we consider whether these arrangements have a tax risk, and what can be done to make them technically sound.

Jan 1, 2005

By S L. Martin, M Wimberger

The binary indicator coding of assay and lithological data according to a single criterion or multiple criteria is a powerful technique for representing mineralised shapes through the modelling of probabilities. This can be as simple as using a single indicator to model the probability of occurrence of a condition, usually a grade threshold or a lithology, but it can also be used with a number of categories. Case studies are presented to show the power of this approach, where the geological controls on mineralisation or on the distribution of a rocktype or alteration, often coupled with mineralisation, are unclear. The categorical approach is often used as a de facto grade filter in disseminated or stockwork mineralisation. The ultimate expression of the indicator formalism is in multiple indicator kriging (MIK), where a conditional distribution of probabilities is generated for each estimation panel. This has applications in recoverable resource estimation, as the input for continuous or categorical simulation, where the distribution of sample grades is multimodal, or when there are superimposed mineralisation events with different orientations. However, in some cases, MIK is being used as an excuse for ignoring a quality geological interpretation. Examples from the public domain show the abuse of the categorical and MIK approaches to modelling probabilities, together with a plea for greater consideration of the geology.

Mar 22, 2022

By D M. Hunter, S M. Iveson, K P. Galvin

For low density materials such as coal, density-based fractionation of particles via the sink-float method is relatively simple due to the availability of liquids of suitable density; however, for high density minerals, suitable heavy liquids are less available and those that are available are expensive and pose significant hazards. At best, sink-float separation can be performed up to densities of 4400 kg/m3 with the use of Clerici’s solution at elevated temperatures. Hence the direct measurement of grade-recovery and density-partition curves is problematic. Therefore, in most cases, beneficiation plants must rely on methods such as QEMSCAN, density tracer particles or very limited information to guide them in the design and optimisation of their plants.This paper describes a density-fractionation method utilising laminar flow through a system of parallel inclined channels to generate a series of overflow fractions at different flow velocities. Here the particles are subject to precise hydrodynamic forces with minimal dispersion or mixing. The size distribution of each overflow fraction at a given flow velocity is obtained using a laser particle size analyser, and combined with a laminar flow model to deduce the corresponding density distribution. The paper describes the application of the method to measure the separation achieved using a REFLUX Classifier to obtain the corresponding feed, product and reject ‘washability curves’, and in turn the full partition surface. Approaches used to corroborate the findings are discussed.CITATION:Hunter, D M, Iveson, S M and Galvin, K P, 2017. A batch elutriation technique for the density-based fractionation of iron ore, in Proceedings Iron Ore 2017, pp 195–104 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Jul 24, 2017

Two years ago I was sitting in a big lecture theatre at the School of Mines in Kalgoorlie at the annual New LeadersÆ Conference listening to a guy tell us all how much he loved his job, travelling the country ælegallyÆ blowing stuff up à and getting paid to do it. I would have paid to see and do the things he spoke of à now IÆm that guy. From finishing a mining engineering degree at the University of Ballarat, through the job hunt, to firing environmental blasts in Tassie and designing and implementing construction blasts in the middle of the Gold Coast. My name is Rohan Stevens and IÆm a blast-o-holic. While the æjob huntÆ we all embark on toward the end of our degrees is a stressful time, itÆs also very exciting in the current climate. There are a number of things I have learnt through both my hunt for the job that best suited me and working for the worldÆs largest explosives manufacturer. If at least you donÆt benefit from my learnings IÆm certain you will enjoy hearing about (and viewing) some of the work I have had the opportunity to be involved with over the last 18 months with Orica Mining Services.

Jan 1, 2008