Australian Mining December 2013

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VOLUME 105/12 – DECEMBER 2013

SERVING THE MINING INDUSTRY SINCE 1908

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COMMENT

Mining Mining’s turning point Australian

Cirrus Media Manufacturing & Electronics Group: Associate Publisher – Martin Sinclair Email: martin.sinclair@cirrusmedia.com.au Editor – Cole Latimer Tel: (02) 8484 0652 Email: ozmining@cirrusmedia.com.au Journalists – Vicky Validakis Tel: (02) 8484 0964 Email: vicky.validakis@cirrusmedia.com.au Brent Balinski Tel: (02) 8484 0680 Email: brent.balinski@cirrusmedia.com.au Alex Heber Tel: (02) 8484 0884 Email: alexandra.heber@cirrusmedia.com.au Group Sales Manager – Tim Richards Tel: (02) 8484 0829 Mob: 0420 550 799 Email: tim.richards@cirrusmedia.com.au QLD and SA Sales Manager – Sharon Amos Tel: (07) 3261 8857 Fax: (07) 3261 8347 Mob: 0417 072 625 Email: sharon.amos@cirrusmedia.com.au WA Representative – Jamie Wade Mob: 0435 945 868 Email: jamie@wadebusiness.com.au South Africa – Bob Stephen Stephen Marketing PO Box 75, Tarlton, Gauteng 1749, South Africa Tel: 27(011) 952 1721 Fax: 27(011) 952 1607 USA – Jonathan Sismey Cirrus Media 24th Floor, 125 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Tel: (1) 212 370 7445 Fax: (1) 212 370 7441 Email: jsismey@ix.netcom.com Larry Arthur Cirrus Media Suite 203, 3700 Campus Drive, Newport Beach, CA 92660 Tel: (1) 949 756 1057 Fax: (1) 949 756 2514 Email: lharthur@ix.netcom.com Graphic Designer – Dave Ashley Production Co-ordinator – Tracy Engle Tel: (02) 8484 0707 Fax: (02) 8484 0966 Subscription Rates – Australia (surface mail) $140.00 (incl GST) New Zealand A$148.00 Overseas A$156.00 Reader Services – 1300 360 126

As 2013 winds down we can finally see what a truly tumultuous year it was for mining.

W

e come to the end of another year and as always I take the opportunity to look both back to the year that has been and forward to what may come.

Because if a new year isn’t a good time for a little introspection on the industry, then when is?

Honestly, I have to say that considering the start of 2013 and the increased gloom that was forecast we have come out surprisingly well.

While many of the forecast job cuts did come to bear, especially on the mining services, coal and gold mining fronts, we expected no less.

The industry had, for two years, run rampant with over-inflated wages and costs - put simply: it Cirrus Media wasn’t sustainable.

Tower 2, Level 3, 475 Victoria Avenue, Chatswood, When you’ve got rivers NSW 2067 Australia Locked Bag 4700, Chatswood Delivery Centre, of cash pouring from your NSW 2067, Australia Tel: (02) 8484 0888 Fax: (02) 8484 0633 site, buying new equipment ABN 80 132 719 861 ISSN 0004-976X rather than investing that www.cirrusmedia.com.au © Copyright Cirrus Media, 2013 more important asset- time, All rights reserved. No part of the publication may be is easier in the short term, reproduced or copied in any form or by any means without the written permission of the publisher. with no heed paid to the long term effect.

Schneider Electric’s Diego Areces put it best: “EveAverage Net Distribution Period ending March 2013 ryone was racing to be the 8,038 biggest...”

Printed by Bluestar Print 83 Derby Street, Silverwater, NSW 2128 No industry could endure Tel: (02) 9748 3411 Published 12 issues a year such high costs and such an attitude without eventually ‘right-sizing’ itself.

A M 1 2 1 3 _ 0 0 0 _ K I N - Which 1 0 is2 what 0 1 3 we - 1 saw 1 - 1 happen over the last half of

www.miningaustralia.com.au

Comment Cole Latimer ozmining@cirrusmedia.com.au 2012 and continue into the first half of this year.

Every day brought a new wave of cuts from miners and METS companies as they sought to cut costs where they could without cutting too deeply and still remaining competitive.

Some managed to pull this off, others didn’t.

Exploration was one of the hardest hit, with many geologist given the cut and exploration investment falling in Queensland by around a third - a move which will save a few dollars now but will have massive repercussions in the long run. Gold also ‘rational-

ised’, falling away from the ridiculously high levels to the point where many marginal mines no longer had the capacity to operate the way they were. It wasn’t until we passed the midpoint of the year that things finally started turning around.

Iron ore made a recovery and has stabilised at a more respectable price; companies started winning contracts again, mine expansions started happening once more.

There was actually a bit of good news.

Although this was marred by a number of unfortunate accidents.

Still, things are looking a bit brighter in the long run. Especially from the energy side, with the next huge boom predicted for the LNG and coal seam gas space, which will definitely be a boon for many of the tradies and professionals with experience in the resources sector who are yet to find another job.

Like 2012, 2013 was also a bit of a mixed bag, and while we aren’t likely to see another massive mining boom like the one just gone, we will see the mining industry coming back and strengthening over the next five years.

In this edition we’ve gone into depth over what happened this year, and what is likely to happen in the coming years.

So sit back, relax, and enjoy the last edition of Australian Mining for 2013.

FRONT COVER

5 T1 2 : 1 8 : 2 8 + 1 1 : 0 0

ON the front cover of this, the final edition of Australian Mining for 2013, we’ve featured the Prospect Awards.

This issue is the Prospect Awards Winners edition.

From more than 100 nominations over 15 categories we managed to narrow it down to the final 15, and have highlighted each winner in this issue, and what made them stand out from the crowd.

We also delve into the year that was, looking at the signficant events of 2013, while also looking forward to 2014 and prediciting how the markets will move.

AustralianMining

December 2013

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Contents Metals Outlook

December 2013 issue

Drill, Blast & Geomechanics

A world first new type of drill is launched….p10

Hydraulics & Pneumatics

The 2014 Metals Outlook forecasts for the year ahead….p46-50

The latest in hydraulic braking systems….p52

Features PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS Australian Mine of the Year .........................p14 Hard Rock Mine of the Year........................p16 Coal Mine of the Year..................................p18 Contractor of the Year .................................p20 Minerals Processing of the Year ...................p21 Community Interaction ................................p22 Manager of the Year ....................................p24 Young Achiever............................................p26 Mining’s Woman of the Year .......................p28 4

December 2013

AustralianMining

Contribution to Mining................................p30 Peoples’ Choice ............................................p32 Explorer of the Year.....................................p34 Innovative Mining Solution ..........................p36 Excellence in Mine OH&S, Safety................p38 Excellence in Environmental Management ...p40 A LOOK BACK: 2013 What happened to 2013?

The year that was ....................................p42-45

MAINTENANCE & MONITORING Bolt removal and thread refurbishment Safer maintenance ........................................ p54

Regulars INDUSTRY COMMENT .................................. p6 NEWS ............................................................ p8 JOBS ............................................................ p56 EVENTS ....................................................... p58 www.miningaustralia.com.au

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INDUSTRY COMMENT

RINEHART’S remonstration

The Dirt discusses Gina Rinehart’s entreaty for mining’s opponents to walk a mile in its shoes.

L

ate last month Gina Rinehart many Australians in the cities have a took a big step and called out bad reaction to even the thought of mining’s critics. mining” she said.

And about time.

“While we’re out there doing Speaking at the launch of the the work ....our critics can do the National Mining and Related Indus- talking! tries Day in Brisbane, Rinehart took “How many Australians appresome time out to take on the many ciate that the efforts of our country’s opponents of mining, and asked miners keep the lights on for a large why they are so against an industry part of the world? We can bemoan that works hard to ensure they can coal, uranium, and shale oil but try live the lives they’re accustomed to. to imagine the lives of billions of She hit out at the industry’s people without electricity; would we portrayal in the media, adding that wish to be just one of them?” people found it easier to attack an She made a strong, and worryindustry they didn’t understand nor ingly accurate point that “increaschose to, while at the same time ingly, today’s children are taught reaping the benefits. that ‘mining is bad’ - that it’s ‘enviAnd rightly so. ronmental vandalism’.

“In a country that owes its “And can you blame them for standard daily 0 d 8off1living 3 P _ a 0ing 0 large 0 _ 1 Npart O3 Rto 4 the - 4 thinking 2 ,0 1it 1 3- :-when 0 0 7 -almost 3 M 0 T1 2 : we 1 1 rA .M p e 0 / 0 /1 1 0 3 P mining and related industries, too have similar in our media.”

She then called on many of those knocking the industry to actually go on a mine site and see that mining isn’t the high paid, lazy and easy job that many have portrayed it to be.

So how many people will take her up on the offer?

We’re going to throw a figure out there, and correct us if we’re wrong - zero.

It’s easier for people to attack what they don’t know, and it’s not all.0 : surprising 4 3 + 1 0 at : 0 We have a disconnect with pri-

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mary industry in this country, just as Fortescue head Andrew Forrest said.

But it’s not unexpected considering that close to 90 per cent of Australians live in an urban environment.

Those that attack the industry will, despite our best efforts and best practice, continue to do so.

The best we can do is educate the rest of the populace and get mining to where it should be held in peoples’ esteem, not just as some hated necessity.

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HEADLINES

The latest mining news and safety Australian Mining presents the latest news and safety affecting you from the boardroom to the mine and everywhere in between. Visit www.miningaustralia.com.au to keep up to date with what is happening.

BHP approves $300m spend, lifting shiploading capacity

Contractors more likely to die on mine sites: report

Opening its coffers, BHP Billiton is spending A report on mining safety in Queensland has $US301 million to replace two shiploaders shown contractors are more likely to die at at its Nelson Point port operations in Port work than full-time employees, prompting Hedland, Western Australia. calls for tighter procedures to be put in place The company said investing in the shiploaders at mine sites. will increase the reliability of its inner harbour The Queensland Mines and Quarry Safety port facilities.

Report for 2012-13 found contractors Updating its shiploaders will lift the company’s represent nine-out-of-ten coal mining industry loading capacity by 5000 tonnes an hour. fatalities over the past decade.

Each shiploader has a loading capacity of Queensland Mine Safety and Health 12,500 tonnes per hour.

Commissioner Stewart Bell said contractors The existing shiploaders are more than 40 on working on mine sites should be afforded years old and currently load iron ore at a rate the same training, safety procedures and of approximately 10,000 tonnes per hour. processes as full-time staff.

“This investment will also create additional “By the very nature of their role, contractors port capacity that can be utilised as a series are often engaged to perform non-standard of debottlenecking initiatives increase the or specialist talks that in some cases require capacity of our Western Australia Iron Ore a higher level of risk management than would supply chain towards 270 million tonnes per normally be needed,” Bell said.

Australian Mining gets the latest news annum (100% basis), at a low capital cost,” The commissioner said he was concerned every day, providing mining professionals BHP said. some sites were of the view that the safety of with the up to the minute information Commissioning of the two replacement contractors was not management’s problem. on safety, news and technology for shiploaders L a nis escheduled Wo r kforSthe a second f e _ half Q Pof. p “I’m d f concerned P a g that e some 1 mining 2 9 / operations 0 7 / 1 3 , the1Australian 2 : 2 4 mining P M and resources next year. regard these risks as not their responsibility, industry. whereas in my view they should review and approve the contractor’s processes and procedures before the work begins, and integrate them into the site’s safety and health management system,” he said.

“There are senior managers at these sites whose job is to manage the risk as required by law for everyone who’s working there – and that includes contractors.”

He stressed that while the mining Selected and used by Stat sector remains the largest contributor to e Governmen Queensland’s economy, and safety has t departments improved dramatically over the last few years, Innovative drug screen cup design Australia w ide there is still much work to be done. minimizes urine handling and A number of contractors have been killed at donor tampering, providing a mine sites this year Australia-wide. unique and efficient approach for on-site drug screening.

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Woodside exec named new WesTrac boss Seven Group Holdings has announced it is appointing a new chief executive for its subsidiary WesTrac Australia.

Currently Chairman of Woodside Energy, Jarvas Croome will head up WesTrac from April 2014.

Seven Group managing director and chief executive Don Voelte said Croome’s practical experience developing and managing people in the resources and technology industry stacks up.

“Having worked with him before, I know he has a terrific grasp of technical and production aspects of the sectors in which we operate and that couples with outstanding commercial and management capabilities,” Veolte said.

Croome replaces WesTrac boss Jim Walker who left the company in August after serving 13 years in the top job.

Thiess $550 million Lake Vermont coal contract Thiess have won an additional $550 million contract at the Lake Vermont Coal mine,near Dysart in Central Queensland.

The contract expands on the $2.3 billion the company was awarded at the mine last year as part of plans to ramp up production from four million tonnes to eight million tonnes per annum. The contract announced today adds to this, with Thiess’ mining know-how being called upon by Jellinbah Resources to increase production again over the remaining five years of the current contract.

Bruce Munro, Thiess’ managing director, said the latest contract showed the company’s ability to exceed expectations.

“We continue to work with our client Jellinbah Resources to reduce costs and safely improve productivities across every aspect of the mining operations, from plant and equipment to local sourcing and empowering our people,” Munro said.

Miner ditches FIFO for Indigenous workers Owner of the Great Australian Mine on the outskirts of Cloncurry have switched from a FIFO workforce of 80 per cent to just 20 per cent by deciding to hire locally.

CopperChem made the decision back in February and Indigenous Liaison Officer at the mine, Leon Gertz, said the move was made to attract more Aboriginal recruits to the project.

Gertz says the locals are “more sustainable employees”.

“They have a connection here. They’re probably already established in terms of housing, understanding the area, less liable to move on over a period of time, so we think there’s more stability.”

Many of the recruits have come through the Dugalunji Training Camp, near Camooweal, which has been able to set up a 10-week “ready-for-work” training course.

With the help of local businesses, including the mine, the training course means most of the trainees have guaranteed employment if they graduate. Aboriginal-owned corporation Myuma was able to set up the deal and general manager Colin Saltmere said it highlighted the importance of investing in young locals.

“We’ve been able to negotiate a contractual agreement where they invest in those trainees and the investment is paying for part of the program and then employing them at the end of it,” he said www.miningaustralia.com.au

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DRILL, BLAST & GEOMECHANICS

DRILLING in a new direction T

he prototype of the world’s tion spend in Australia have also first coiled tubing drill rig had to cut back on exploration be(CT Rig) for exploration has cause of difficulties in raising equity been launched in the Adelaide Hills from shareholders. Underpinning today. both cases is a perception about the The rig will be commissioned by risk/reward for exploration. the Deep Exploration Technologies “At the moment investors are Cooperative Research Centre (DET risk-averse, and the exploration inCRC), which was established in dustry (for both major and junior 2010 to uncover more cost-effective companies) is generally not good at methods for exploration under deep identifying and making the business rock cover. case on the likely rewards accruing The launch of the CT Rig is to from their exploration programs. be the highlight of the DET CRC’s “More than ever, we need to conference, which is being held to- find cost-effective methods of minday at the Brukunga Drilling Re- erals exploration,” Hillis added. search and Training Facility in the “Currently, 80 per cent of AusAdelaide Hills. tralia’s minerals production comes DET CRC CEO Richard Hillis from mines that were discovered said the “the CT Rig promises to more than 30 years ago, yet more reduce the time and expenses associ- than 50 per cent of Australia’s exated with drilling operations to find port income comes from mining.

Additionally it is also smaller new mineral deposits”.

Indeed, based on current reserves, and lighter than conventional rigs, “The launch of the prototype resources and rates of exploitation, and uses a motor at the bottom of CT Rig comes at a vital time for the half of Australia’s existing major the hole as opposed to the surface, mining industry,” he said. non-bulk commodity mines could reducing energy and fuel used.

The exploration sector has been close down within 7 to 18 years, Hillis went on to say the drill particularly hard hit during the “By reducing the time and ex- would utilise other technologies indownturn. pense to find mineral deposits hid- cluding downhole sensors as well.

In Queensland the sector has den under deep, barren cover rock, “In order to ensure the future of shrunk by 31 per cent year-on-year. the CT Rig will encourage more mining in Australia, and in all heavi“This is not just a Queensland mineral exploration both in Aus- ly explored countries, new technolotrend, but a problem being felt right tralia and worldwide.” gies must be developed to explore to across Australia, and indeed globInstead of using drill rods like greater depths in the vast, prospecally,” the Queensland Exploration typical rigs, the CT Rig uses a con- tive areas where mineralised baseCouncil said. tinuous reel of tubing which elimi- ment is hidden beneath deep, barren Minex Consulting managing di- nates the manual handling of drill cover rocks. rector Richard Schodde stated that rods, directly addressing many of “The CT Rig has the potential to “mining companies are under ex- the hand injury issues that arise dur- significantly lower the cost per metre treme pressure to lower costs and ing manual handling, while at the drilled, which will enable companies improve operating margins. Cutting same time maximising the amount to be more aggressive with their drillback on exploration can save the of time the bit is at the bottom of ing programs and drill more holes.” company money in the short term – the hole.

Schodde added that “the best but at the expense of putting its long The rig launched today uses steel way to “sell the story” on the value term security at risk. tubing, however there are plans to of exploration is to demonstrate a A“Junior M 0 8 1companies, 3 _ 0 0 0 _which E A Smake 1 experiment 2 0 1 3 - with 0 7 -other 1 1 T 1 5 : mate5 3 : 0 major 1 + 1 exploration 0 : 0 0 tubing success”. up nearly half of the total explora- rials such as carbon fibre.

“The problem is that there

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A new way of drilling has been launched.

haven’t been many significant discoveries in Australia in recent years.

Most of the outcropping deposits in Australia have been found – and industry is having to progressively go under deeper cover. This means industry has to use indirect methods to discover the deposit and this is more expensive to do and riskier.”

“In combination with real-time sensors (which are being developed by the DET CRC), the Coiled Tubing Drill Rig would radically speed up the rate of target testing,” he said.

“The ability to learn as you go by getting instant feedback on the ore grade and mineral potential of the local area will help quickly guide the company to zero-in on the deposit.

“This is contrast to the current stop-start approach to exploration which requires several campaigns of work over several years to delineate the deposit.

“Company management know that ‘time equals money’.”

www.miningaustralia.com.au

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10TH ANNUAL AUSTRALIAN MINING PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS

The 10th Annual Australian Mining Prospect Awards An insight into this year’s winners.

I

t’s that time of year again.

The Australian Mining Prospect Awards.

And, despite the wind down that we are seeing commodity price wise in the industry, this year’s event was still a big one.

Mining’s night of nights went off with a bang.

More than 300 people gathered together to celebrate, recognise, and reward excellence in the mining industry.

It was doubly special as the event was the tenth for Australian Mining, highlighting our team celebrating high achievers in the

The awards ran across 15 categories, and included the new Peoples’ Choice award.

industry for a decade now.

Held for the first time in the Ivy Ballroom in the heart of Sydney, the crowd

A M1 2 1 3 _ 0 0 0 _ MO N 2 More than 300 people attended the event.

1

watched as the finalists were read out across 15 categories; cheering as the winners were announced.

NSW Minerals Council head Stephen Galilee opened the night, discussing the state of mining in New South Wales, and how every part of the state benefited from the industry - taking it down to the very suburb in the case of Sydney, presenting dollar figures for how much mining contributed to each region.

Following this the MCs took to the stage - two of the Chaser boys, Chris Taylor 2 0 1 3 - 1 1 - 1 5 T1 3 : 5 9 : 1 4 + 1 1 : 0 and Craig Reucassel.

They introduced the 15 categories for the awards, which this year saw more than 100 nominations

across the board. This year also saw the introduction of the new Peoples’ Choice category, where we went to you, the Australian Mining audience, to choose who was worthy of recognition.

This new category ended up garnering close to 1500 votes in just over a week.

The award itself was close, with only a few votes separating the first three finalists. And so, once all the finalists were read out, this year’s event wrapped once more, recgonising and showcasing the people and companies in the industry who are not just surviving, but thriving.

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The 10th annual

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10TH ANNUAL AUSTRALIAN MINING PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS

Australian Mine of the Year For its innovative triple bottom line approach GlencoreXstrata’s Mangoola mine has won the AUSTRALIAN MINE OF THE YEAR AWARD.

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lencoreXstrata’s Mangoola coal mine has been named Australian Mine of the Year.

Accepting the award, operation manager Tony Israel said this is a significant achievement for the Mangoola coal mine, which only began operations in 2011.

“We don’t look for any accolades we just go about our business and to get this sort of recognition is just fantastic, I’m just speechless but so proud and looking forward to sharing this with the people back at Mangoola,” Israel said.

The judges recognised Mangoola mine for its triple bottom line approach to operating a site located in a community sensitive to mining activities.

“We don’t align with any other operations, we’re out in a fairly remote location and the community is particularly sensitive to us being there, we need to manage that and be proactive, not reactive,” Israel said.

Operating in a fairly remote location outside of Wybong in the upper Hunter Valley, Israel explained GlencoreXstrata has made investments in environmental management technology in order to meet – and in many cases exceed – environmental compliance requirements in areas such as water, noise, air and dust management.

The Mangoola coal mine team accepting the award for the Australian Mine of the Year category.

“In the process we have engaged with our local communities on an ongoing basis and successfully demonstrated that mining can minimise its impact on communities and the environment while providing important economic and employment benefits,” Israel said.

In a highly competitive category, when deciding the winner, judges said it wasn’t based solely on tonnes.

Mangoola’s continuous 24/7 operation employs about 300 people – with a good proportion sourced from local Hunter Valley townships.

The mine took a triple bottom line approach to operations.

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Notably, only three years ago, Mangoola employed more than half its workforce from non-mining related backgrounds, a feat which created a significant training requirement that the miner addressed through the use of simulators for both initial and ongoing operator training.

The judges said the site’s community engagement and commitment to providing employment opportunities, particularly within local communities, was also a weighty factor in the decision.

Signing a Memorandum of Understanding with the local Muswellbrook Council, Mangoola said it aims to recruit locally, a strategy which Israel explained has seen turnover rates fall from 10 per cent to almost zero.

“If we can continue to employ local people where they have the skills we will do that and develop them like we’ve done with our current employees,” he said.

“Over 50 per cent of our current employees were from non-mining backgrounds, people with no experience at all and we’re achieving

above benchmark productivities and utilisation rates.

“We also have the largest percentage of women employed at any mine in the Hunter Valley.

“We’ll continue to recruit local people and develop local people.”

The site also has expansion plans in the works, it is proposing to ramp up production by almost 30 per cent to 13.5 million tonnes of coal a year; a move it estimates will create another 150 new jobs.

The judges said the mine also took out the award because of productivity per-

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formance and for taking an innovative approach to environmental management.

“It’s really about firstly understanding the risks and the environment in which we operate,” Israel said.

Environmental management at the mine is considered best practice, as the site focuses operations on minimising community impacts.

Mangoola has implemented a network of real time and continuous air quality and noise monitoring stations complete with alarms and has full coverage of the entire operation.

Recently fielding a number of complaints from its neighbours, instead of battening down the hatches GlencoreXstrata invited the community on site to discuss the issues.

Taking the feedback on board, Mangoola took another look at its operations and has now developed customised noise attenuated equipment.

The mine determined the complaints centred around track slap noise which occurs when dozers are reversing on the coal stockpile.

With this in mind the mine enlisted the help of a local mining service company which customised a steel structure, dubbed the Armadillo, to fully enclose the dozer’s drive areas, muffling track slap noise.

The ‘Armadillo’ eliminated much of the problem of track slap noise. www.miningaustralia.com.au

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10TH ANNUAL AUSTRALIAN MINING PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS

Hard Rock Mine of the Year For its impressive progress from discovery to full blown mining, Sandfire Resources’ DeGrussa mine has won HARD ROCK MINE OF THE YEAR.

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andfire Resources has had a run most companies can only dream of, with its DeGrussa mine going from discovery to production in three short years.

The copper and gold mine was a standout finalist for the judges at this year’s Prospect Awards, with the miner walking away with the Hard Rock Mine of the Year award.

The high grade VMS copper gold mineralisation was discovered in mid-2009, with the company able to gain approval, construct and begin production at the site within a very quick timeframe.

The judges said it is “simply an amazing three year achievement”.

Sandfire Resources’ DeGrussa Copper Mine was officially opened by West Australian Premier Colin Barnett in August 2013, who heralded the arrival of a standout high grade, lowcost new copper mines in the Asia-Pacific region.

The $400 million project, now WA’s biggest copper mine, produced 64,017 tonnes of copper and 42,679 ounces of gold in the 2013 financial year, and set up a highly profitable open pit direct shipping ore operation which was completed earlier this year.

Sandfire’s Karl Simich accepting the award from Atlas Copco’s Joe Farrugia

This underpinned an impressive maiden net profit after income tax of $88 million for the year on sales revenue of $507.3 million.

The DeGrussa operation generated strong operating cash flow of $250.2 million – highlighting the cash generating potential of the efficient, low-cost mine. This enabled Sandfire to repay almost $100 million in its first full year of operations, while continuing to fund aggres-

sive exploration, both at DeGrussa and across its growing Australian exploration portfolio.

Production for the 2014 financial year is forecast at 65-75,000 tonnes of copper and 35-45,000oz of gold at an impressively low C1 cash operating cost of US$1.051.15 per pound of payable copper.

Speaking at the ceremony in Sydney, the company’s managing director Karl Simich

The mine is the largest new copper discovery in Western Australia in years.

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was clearly very proud of the operation.

“We’re very proactive in all the things we did to enable us to get from basically the first drill hole into cash flow inside three years which is an extraordinary event.”

He said the biggest hurdles in getting the mine up and running included ensuring technical work and government approvals ticked all the right boxes.

“I think the biggest thing is making sure it was a technical success in going from discovery to a fully- fledged, competent, technical mining operation that will work, but also dealing with the government regulations,” Simich said.

Simich is a passionate leader, and with 26 years’ experience in the mining industry, knows how to get the best out of his workforce.

Dedicating the award to his “wonderful team of people”, Simich said it has been a gratifying experience to see “what people can do when you go and give them some freedom”.

“It’s not one individual, it’s about a whole bunch of

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ordinary people doing extraordinary things,” he said.

“What’s been the most wonderful thing is seeing the proactiveness of people and also seeing what people can do when you let them run freely and let them challenge themselves.”

Sandfire said that at the heart of the DeGrussa operation is a highly efficient underground mine, accessed via the Evans Decline. The underground mine plan comprises over 38km of lateral development, enabling Sandfire to simultaneously extract ore from multiple faces across the four main deposits.

Underground development is proceeding on schedule, with five stopes now in various stages of development and production.

However, Simich has big plans for Sandfire, stating that on the back of the success at DeGrussa, his company is aiming to expand its portfolio in the next five years to include other operations.

“From our perspective it’s about continuting to do what we do because we love it,” Simich said. “[We are] looking for more opportunities and more mines we can potentially go and develop, [and] I would like to think that over the next three years Sandfire is not just a one mine company but maybe a multiple mine company.”

Highlighting the importance of “aggressive exploration”, Simich said he was sure the company would be at the helm of more success stories.

“Hopefully there is a lot more exploration success because that’s what gets everyone really excited.”

Although DeGrussa is one of the major copper and gold deposit discoveries in recent times, the confident MD said there were plenty more to find which may be bigger. www.miningaustralia.com.au

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10TH ANNUAL AUSTRALIAN MINING PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS

Coal Mine of the Year For a dramatic turnaround in operations and safety on site Anglo American’s Moranbah North mine has won COAL MINE OF THE YEAR.

F

or the second year in a row an Anglo American mine has taken out the Coal Mine of the Year Award at the 10th annual Australian Mining Prospect Awards.

This time Moranbah North mine received the top honour for a complete turnaround in its performance within the space of 18 months.

The catalyst for the complete operations review and subsequent turnaround was a fall of ground in the conveyor drift, which caused significant production constraints.

The results identified that mine planning, people management systems and processes were not the best fit for purpose.

Anglo American took action to change its culture and bring new innovations that slashed its injury rate, and in turn saw its CHPP plant achieve six years LTI free.

Accepting the Coal Mine of the Year Award, General Manager Jim Canning said he was absolutely delighted Moranbah North had been recognised by industry peers, telling the room of 300 people from across Australia that the award was the result of a lot of hard work from a

The miner changed its operations from the top down, addressing planning, people, and culture on site.

committed team of people.

“We’re very very proud, it’s all about a team effort at Moranbah North, and as general manager I am very happy,” Canning said.

“It is a true honour to receive this award, which belongs to the fantastic group of people who were determined to turn Moranbah North into the safe and productive operation it is today.

“Moranbah North is now

achieving what many thought wasn’t possible – week upon week of 100 longwall cutting hours and the best safety record we have ever seen.”

The judges said Moranbah North came out on top because of a turnaround experienced on site where management successfully implemented a culture change.

“The viewpoint was the Moranbah North organisation under Anglo American

Anglo American says it is now seeing the best longwall cutting safety record it has ever seen on site.

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was an asset that was being poorly managed,” Canning said.

“Anglo American made a strategic decision to change the management team out; they decided that we needed a strong management team to develop a culture and behavioural change.

“It’s very important that you have a good working relationship culture but when you’ve got a bias towards the workforce managing the mine rather than the management it becomes very difficult.”

Canning explained that throughout 2013 the site achieved significant safety improvements, record production rates, and best practice longwall performance.

“We are currently sitting at eight weeks in a row of consecutive 100 hour plus weeks and we know we can continue to keep this up and reach great heights in the future,” he said.

“I couldn’t be happier to accept this award and after a delivering record production in the first half of 2013, we are now on track to delivering our most productive

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and safe year in our 15 year history.”

Anglo American’s Met Coal Chief Executive Officer Seamus French congratulated Head of Underground Operations Glen Britton, Jim Canning and the Moranbah North team on their “well deserved” awards.

“A fantastic effort by everyone involved – Moranbah North is now delivering safe, world-leading longwall performance, showing us what is possible at our existing undergrounds and setting us up for the future Grosvenor operation,” French said.

Last year the company’s Capcoal open cut operation received the Coal mine of the Year Award.

Canning said looking ahead Moranbah North is aiming to maintain its drive.

“This prize tonight is the ultimate mark; it’s a benchmark for tomorrow’s performance,” he said.

And already that goal is becoming a reality, Canning explained.

According to Anglo American in early May 2013 the Moranbah North reached 125 cutting hours in one week to produce 245000 tonnes of hard coking coal, the best week of production ever experienced at the mine.

“We are presently breaking our own production records, safety records and cost effectiveness,” he said.

The company added that “Moranbah North has gone from strength to strength and is now on track to delivering its most productive and safe year in its 15 year history”.

“Yes we’ve had to make some difficult decisions, downsizing the workforce last year but the benefits, profits and shall we say advancements from that are now benefiting this year’s performance.

“The workforce at this moment in time is producing coal.” www.miningaustralia.com.au

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10TH ANNUAL AUSTRALIAN MINING PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS

Contractor of the Year For its innovative approach to underground ventilation Abergeldie has won the CONTRACTOR OF THE YEAR AWARD.

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or the construction of Ulan West mine’s ventilation shaft which was delivered ahead of time, below budget and with zero incidents, Abergeldie Complex Infrastructure has won this year’s Contractor of the Year Award.

The Ulan West ventilation shaft contract was for design and construction of a 4.5m finished diameter, hydrostatically lined, vertical ventilation shaft to a depth of 46m to serve underground coal mine working at Glencore’s Ulan west operations.

Initially, Glencore proposed that the shaft was to be sunk using a drill and blast methodology by which mechanical rock breaking equipment was to be used with lining and shoring to be carried our progressively in pace with excavation using interlocking precast concrete segments.

However close consultation between Abergeldie, Glencore’s engineering team and representatives from the Department of Primary Industries identified a number of safety, efficiency and logistical difficulties with the original design proposal.

MA 0 8 1 3 _ 0 4 2 _ F E R By working very closely

Abergeldie used blind boring method instead of drill and blast to create the 46m shaft.

with Glencore’s engineering tary drill technique that team, Abergeldie developed works remotely from the an alternative, safer, and more surface downwards. A heavefficient construction solution. ily weighted drilling assemInstead of drill and blast bly, suspended from above, it was decided that blind provides the vertical thrust boring methodology should to a hard rock cutter head be used to sink the shaft, equipped with disc type tools, with welded steel liner seg- as found on hard rock tunnel ments used instead of the boring machines. originally proposed segAbergeldie said the mented concrete liners. disc cutters grind concrete 1 2 0 1 3 - 0 7 - 1 8 T1 5 : 1 6 : 0 9 + 1 0 : 0 0 Blind boring uses a ro- grooves, fragmenting the

rock between the cutter paths into relatively large pieces and the weight of the drill itself provides all the downward pressure required while being supported at two points to control deviation to within half a per cent of depth in horizontally bedded strata.

The shaft is kept full of water throughout the drilling and lining process with the rock fragments

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transported from the working face to the surface by a strong flow of water directed around the cutter head and piped up through the centre of the drill rods.

Abergeldie was required to design the shaft, mobilise all machinery and supporting facilities to site, set up, and operate the blind bore drilling rig, carry out bulk earthworks for the construction of on-site sedimentation ponds for recycling of the drill process water and to collect drill spoil from the cutting head, arrange fabrication of the steel liner segments for the shaft, install the steel liner segments and weld them together into continuous hydrostatic surface.

The judges commented that Abergeldie took an innovative approach in installing the ventilation shaft “making a traditionally dangerous practice very safe”.

Abergeldie Complex Infrastructure’s managing director, Michael Boyle, said his team was delighted to win the award.

“To win an award judged amongst your peers is really satisfying,” Boyle said.

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10TH ANNUAL AUSTRALIAN MINING PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS

Minerals Processing of the Year For its record six year LTI free, Anglo American’s Moranbah North CHPP has won the MINERALS PROCESSING OF THE YEAR AWARD.

A

nglo American’s Moranbah North Coal Handling Preparation Plant was the winner of Australian Mining Minerals Processing of the Year award.

The judges awarded Moranbah North the trophy for achieving six years operating Lost Time Injury free.

The judges said “Moranbah North’s record of going six years LTI free is an impressive achievement, let’s hope they can keep it going for another six”.

In January 2012 a major restructure of the Moranbah North operation was undertaken, resulting in high longwall and development operational times and corresponding record tonnages and metres.

Furthermore, the business risk mitigation processes were reviewed, leading to stringent guidelines, systems and leading edge innovation introduced to the operation to ensure the Life of Mine integrity is under no circumstances compromised.

The improvements have been delivered across a number of areas, but funMA 0 8 1 3 _ 0 4 3 _ F E R damentally, they have been 2

“It’s understanding day to day, if you get to a month there’s no reason you can’t get to a year LTI free.”

produced by strong leadership, a clear vision and increased accountability.

A lot of work has been completed, including improving time to first coal and time to last coal. This means getting the workforce safely to the face as soon as possible after beginning their shift to start producing coal as early as possible.

The workforce keeps the longwall cutting until the 2 0 1 3 - 0 7 - 1 8 T1 5 : absolute end of their shift

which leads to more tonnes on the belt and throughput.

Improvements made to the standard and reliability of the coal clearance system, the main conveyor system that transports coal out of the mine, have played a large part of the success at the mine.

Accepting the award CHPP maintenance manager Paul Stephan said the operation has gone six years 1 6 : 4 6 + 1 0 : 0 0 without an LTI by taking

each day as it comes.

“It’s about understanding the day to day, if you get to a month there’s no reason why you can’t get to a year and then it’s about understanding how you got to a year,” he said.

“If you’ve done it for a year there’s no reason why you can’t do it for ten years.”

Stephan explained while the wash plant is celebrating six years, it’s now aiming higher.

“While we’re talking about six years, we’re looking at seven, eight and nine years,” he said.

Culture plays a big part when it comes to safety on site, Stephan explained.

“It plays a big part, it’s a team aspect, once people believe that they can work safely, they actually own the process and they don’t want to spoil that process,” he said.

“It’s a major part of the culture, it’s a pride of owning that culture onsite.”

Looking ahead Stephan said the wash plant is looking to communicate its safety learnings to other processes on site.

“I think the wash plant is already there and in the underground operation we’re well on the way to get there as well,” he said.

“It’s about having those people in the CHPP understanding what they’ve done and communicating that to the other processes.

“As a mine, it’s not just about the CHPP, it’s about understanding as a whole mine understanding how we get to that six or seven years of safety improvement.”

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10TH ANNUAL AUSTRALIAN MINING PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS

Community Interaction For their focus on helping miners get homer safely, OPEN4U Breakfast has won the COMMUNITY INTERACTION AWARD.

Sponsored by

I

n the small Hunter Valley township of Broke, at about 4.30am a group of about six mining stalwarts are making an effort to combat the ill effects mining has had on the region’s tired employees.

The local volunteers launched the OPEN4U Breakfast about a year ago, with no funding or connection with any mines, recognising fatigue and depression was ripping holes through their tight knit community.

The OPEN4U Breakfast volunteers have now been awarded the Community Interaction award at this year’s Australian Mining Prospect Awards.

Accepting the award on behalf of the group, volunteer Barry Cox said the initiative started when a father and son from the local community were involved in a road accident after completing a long night shift.

Cox said the group simply didn’t want incidents like this to happen anymore.

“We thought if we could give the boys a bit of time to relax, refresh, have some-

The group was a community initative designed to fight fatigue.

thing to eat and then move on home, that’s all we wanted was to prevent another accident, and I think it’s working,” he said.

Surrounded by a number

of coal mines including Bulga and Ravensworth, the gathering started off small but has grown significantly over the last 12 months to now average between 30 and 50

Between 30 and 50 miners stop for a free breakfast and a chat after their shifts.

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mine workers stopping for a free breakfast and a chat.

“We’re now getting mines in the area calling up to see if their people can call in,” Cox explained.

“We’ve gone from one or two miners of a morning 12 months ago to now seventy miners calling in.”

He said it’s not just operators using the service, with managers and general managers also calling in from different mines in the area.

Cox added that it has evolved into an opportunity for all the different operations to get together.

“Some of them work on dozers two or three kilometres away from each other, they don’t get to meet with each other, so we provide a fire and they sit around the fire and talk, we’re thrilled about that,” he said.

Under a blue gazebo, the volunteers cook up breakfast once a week, alternating Monday and Friday so miners on different rotations

have the opportunity to have a break and get home safely.

Discussing the award, fellow volunteer Roy Palmer said the result is “truly humbling”.

“Truly we are without words to describe our sheer delight,” he said.

Commenting on the decision to award OPEN4U this year’s coveted Community Interaction Award, the judges said it is a valuable initiative for the Hunter Valley mining community.

“Bringing locals and miners together after shifts to reduce the effects of fatigue and promote a sense of camaraderie is worthy of recognition,” they said.

“We’ll never know if we’ve helped anyone, it’s not something you can measure,” Mark Jolly a volunteer and cofounder of the initiative told Australian Mining.

“But I’m confident if we’ve helped someone get home safely we’ve done our jobs.” www.miningaustralia.com.au

FOX4024[CLHESC].pdf

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Keep the mob happy Gangster Squad (MA15+) Even on a remote mine site, your workers will always be entertained with an in-room Foxtel package.

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To keep your workers entertained after a tough day’s work, install Foxtel on your site today.

Call 03 8325 3159 to talk to a Business Specialist today.

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AM1213_024

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2013-11-27T15:43:23+11:00

10TH ANNUAL AUSTRALIAN MINING PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS

Manager of the Year For leading ERA’s Ranger mine team in closing its open cut pit, Mike Stone has been recognised as the MANAGER OF THE YEAR.

F

or steering his team to the successful completion of open cut mining at Energy Resources of Australia’s Ranger Mine, Pit 3, five weeks ahead of schedule and with zero incidents, Mike Stone has walked away with this year’s Mine Manager award.

Mike Stone is Mining Operations Manager at Energy Resources of Australia (ERA), which operates the Ranger uranium mine in Jabiru, in the Northern Territory, Australia.

Ranger’s success as one of the world’s premier uranium mines hinges on the successful transition from open cut to an underground operation, a transition which today is well underway with the construction of the Ranger 3 Deeps exploration decline.

From 2011, through 2012, to the first half of 2013, Stone successfully engaged operational mining teams with a strong focus on productivity, safety and communication, playing a pivotal role in the successful completion of open cut mining at Ranger.

The completion of open cut mining in November 2012 was achieved five weeks ahead of schedule, with zero

Stone was recognised for leading the team to close the pit ahead of schedule.

lost time injuries for the year, and enabled ERA to successfully recover the remaining high grade ore located at the bottom of Pit 3.

This brought to a close a 31 year chapter in the history of uranium mining, in which ERA became one of only three uranium mines in the word to produce more than 100,000 tonnes of uranium oxide, and positioned ERA to take full advantage of its new role as an underground exploration operation.

After decades of open cut mining, the operating Ranger Pit 3 was deep and steep, with the remaining high grade ore located at the bottom, where the orebody plunged deeper into the earth.

This deeper orebody forms part of the Ranger 3 Deeps mineralised zone, which is estimated to contain an estimated 34,000 tonnes of uranium oxide, and represents one of the world’s most significant recent uranium discoveries.

The mine is moving from open cut to underground operations to access higher grade ores.

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While ERA developed plans for an underground exploration decline, the task for mining operations was to safely access and recover remaining high grade ore in Pit 3, in line with the schedule for closure of open cut mining at the end of 2013.

With ERA committed to increased capital expenditure on water management and the underground exploration decline, and a general softening of global prices for uranium, the contribution of the high grade ore to ERA’s bottom line was critical.

Stone’s mining operations teams faced significant challenges, of which the greatest was the Top End’s signature feature – incredible wet seasons.

After each wet season, there would be a delay in accessing the pit due to the time required to pump out the water that had accumulated. With the pit progressively reaching maximum depth, the volume of water increased, taking more time to de-water.

Shortly after Stone arrived at ERA from the arid plains of the Pilbara, he

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witnessed some of the heaviest rainfall experienced in the Jabiru region in the 2010/2011 wet season, and then again in the following 2011/2012 wet season.

Additional challenges came with strong competition for mine haul truck drivers; the voluntary shutdown made it harder to retain skilled operators.

The business response to the planned transition from open cut mining to a focus on underground exploration and processing stockpiled ore was to seek savings in all aspects of the business.

In short, the ERA mining operations manager’s outlook for 2012 was a pit full of water, shortage of skilled staff, budget cuts, and a non-negotiable deadline of December 31 for completing one of the world’s greatest open cut uranium mines.

Clear communication between Stone’s mining operations requirements and the water management team resulted in close working arrangements, in which both groups collaborated on plans designed to deliver ERA’s overall water management and mining operations objectives.

In July 2011 the Water Management team commissioned additional pond water treatment infrastructure, doubling the existing water treatment capacity.

This accelerated removal of water from the pit and the operations team was able to reduce the level of water in the pit to resume mining in June 2012. Stone also oversaw changes to blasting techniques which improved safety and productivity, and backfilling rehabilitation efficiencies. Stone said he was humbled by the win, giving much credit to the success of the operation to his team.

“It was a team effort, I am very lucky that I have a confident, supportive team.” www.miningaustralia.com.au

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Leading the way.

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10TH ANNUAL AUSTRALIAN MINING PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS

Young Achiever of the Year Plant Miner founder Michael Trusler has been recognised as 2013’s YOUNG ACHIEVER OF THE YEAR.

M

ichael Trusler took out the Young Achiever of the Year award for creating a plant and machinery hire website that takes the hassle out of sourcing equipment for mining projects.

PlantMiner.com.au has been live for three months and in that time Trusler said the site has already received over $20 million worth of quote requests and enquiries.

The judges said Trusler was recognised for an ingenious idea that was implemented to perfection.

“For setting up his own company and addressing the issue of sourcing capital equipment Trusler should be congratulated,” they said.

After working at a mine site in QLD as a project manager, Trusler said he saw the difficulty in sourcing plant and equipment to hire for mine site construction projects.

“One of my job roles was to hire the plant and equipment for our jobs and there was a real struggle in that there my no type of CarSales portal where you could just jump on and find what you need.”

The idea for the site came to Trusler on a plane ride from Moranbah to Brisbane where he jotted the light-bulb moment down a piece of paper.

Trusler won the award for creating an innovative plant and machinery sourcing website.

“Around $3 billion a year gets spent on plant and equipment hire and for there not to be a centralised database or portal for that is an absolute crime,” Trusler stated.

“We looked to really fill that gap and solve the problem within the industry.”

Since then the young entrenpenuer has hit the ground running, with the site quickly becoming a goto for workers in the mining sector.

The online portal lists over 400,000 pieces of plant and machinery for hire from

The site allows miners to get the right spec equipment locally, faster.

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more than 700 companies Australia-wide.

The site presents itself as a one-stop shop for the procurement of plant and hire equipment, stating that there is no longer the need for procurement officers to trawl through thousands of Google and Yellow Pages listings to find what exactly what they’re after.

The site works by connecting searchers with the specific plant and equipment for hire that they are looking for, right down to all of the safety features and attachments.

The search functionality of the site features a location tracker so users are able to see exactly what plant and machinery is immediately available to them in their region.

While a safety features tab means users can update their search with specific requirements including BMA compliance, hand/safety rails, and mine spec just to name a few.

Search results then include the availability of equipment and machinery along with pictures, specs, descriptions and the direct contact details of the plant and equipment supplier so users can contact them.

Expressions of interest can also be sent from the site, as well as tender documents.

Users can also opt to send a direct enquiry where the supplier will be notified

by SMS or email and get back to them.

The site says it can save businesses time and money by having plant and hire equipment needs in one place.

From portaloos to 100-tonne excavators – the website caters for all the equipment.

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The easy-to-use portal breaks down into categories everything a mine site may need including forklifts, generators, lighting, site amenities, excavators and light vehicles.

While specific industry categories features lists of all the equipment imaginable in that sector.

For example the ‘mining and construction’ category features graders, chutes, water trucks, tractors and tanks just to name a few.

And for many companies preferring to stay loyal to the tried and tested machines, popular brands such as Bell, CAT, Kenworth, Manitou, Hitachi, Crown and Volvo are also listed for users.

Not only does the site benefit those looking for gear, but also hire and rental companies who may have been affected by the downturn in the mining sector.

The portal puts hire and rental companies’ equipment right in front of the eyes of key decision makers – with high quality photos and company logos featuring heavily throughout the differing categories.

With the initial success of the portal in Australia, Trusler hopes to expand the site into the U.S.A, Europe, and Asian markets this year.

“The US market is on absolute steroids compared to Australia so if we can find the right investor to really hit the market hard over there we would love to expand our business model which has worked so well here,” Trusler said.

Trusler said the most important advice he could give to other young professionals wanting to go it alone was to find a good team of people: “Doing it on your own is extremely difficult,” he said.

“Finding one or two people who are extremely passionate and invested in the idea you have is important.” www.miningaustralia.com.au

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10TH ANNUAL AUSTRALIAN MINING PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS

Mining’s Woman of the Year For her leadership and active mentoring in the industry, Liz Watts is MINING’S WOMAN OF THE YEAR.

L

iz Watts has proven herself to be a strong role model for women in the mining sector. Working as the operations manager at Glencore’s Glendell mine, Watts is responsible for a workforce of over 380 people and a $200 million operating budget.

As a leader, Watts recognised early in her career that the mining industry was more about managing interactions with people and influencing outcomes than it is the ability to “move dirt and mine coal”.

She holds the view that the skills required not only to survive but to excel centre around leadership and more importantly, leadership that results in positive change.

“The ability to effectively develop a vision, align the horsepower and energy of the team and move forward with compounding momentum was not on the curriculum of my mining engineering degree. I have learnt the value of these skills through being exposed to leaders who emulate these attributes,” Watts said.

Watts’ own personal and professional objectives are centred around identify-

Watts was recognised for her work in mentoring younger miners and working with the community.

ing opportunities to improve her own leadership ability so that she has more to offer the team around her in assisting them to reach their full potential. Taking out this year’s Prospect Award for Woman of the Year, Watts said she recognised the importance of attracting more females to the mining sector.

The judges stated that Watts was recognised for being a positive role model that

has “challenged the paradigm of women being not willing or able to perform such frontline roles in the open cut coal mining industry”.

Growing up in New South Wales’ Hunter Valley, Watts graduated with a Mining Engineering Degree in 2001, as the only female in a class of seventy.

Watts kicked off her career with Rio Tinto, progressing quickly through the

Watts is the operations manager at GlencoreXstrata’s Glendell coal mine.

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ranks to be promoted to Superintendent level within four years of graduation.

In January 2012, Watts was promoted to the role of operations manager at the Glendell Mine which last year produced about 7million ROM tonnes.

Watts now has the responsibility of managing a site with a workforce of over 380 employees and contractors and a $200 million operating budget.

Glencore said very few females exist in senior operational roles in the Hunter Valley coal mining Industry, stating that by taking on positions such as open cut examiner, production superintendent, mine manager and operations manager, Watts has reset the paradigm in terms of the aspirations and achievements of women in mining.

With women in the NSW sector still under-represented, making up only 11 per cent of the state’s total workforce, Watts said there was a wealth of opportunities for anyone who wished to carve out a career in the sector.

“I think it’s more the fact that maybe females don’t have a full appreciation of

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the different roles and the different opportunities that are available within in mining which may be the reason for the low representation,” Watts said.

“From my experience, I haven’t found anything that really holds you back – if you want to get and have a go it’s certainly supported and endorsed.”

A passionate industry ambassador, Watts advised anyone who wanted to be involved in mining to figure out what they are good at and “go for it”.

“If you want to have a go, mining is the place to do it,” she said.

“There are so many aspects to mining that you’re not necessarily channelled into one path which is the great thing about miningyou’ve got so many diverse options.

“I would just say if you’ve got a high level of energy and you want to be creative, be in the outdoors and interact with people – mining is definitely for you.”

Watts has developed strong networks with women and mining professionals generally within the NSW coal mining Industry both internal and external to Glencore’s immediate business.

Most recently, Watts participated in discussions aimed at identifying industry recommendations to address Women Representation in Male Dominated Industries.

This work is being facilitated by the Australian Human Rights Commission.

As a manager residing the local community, Watts actively contributes to the social fabric of the surrounding areas by facilitating support through Glendell for a number of local initiatives.

Watts also has a keen interest in mentoring and providing support to candidates undertaking studies towards their statutory qualifications. www.miningaustralia.com.au

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Orica congratulates Liz Watts for winning Mining’s Woman of the Year Award.

Liz Watts is the Operations Manager Glendell mine, Glencore, and has been recognised for her outstanding contribution to the mining industry.

Liz has proven herself to be a strong role model for women in the mining sector. Rising through the ranks at Rio Tinto, Xstrata and now Glencore, Liz is responsible for Glendell mine with a workforce of over 380 people.

Liz’s recent mentoring work at AIMEX and contributions to women’s representation in male dominated industries, facilitated by the Australian Human Rights Commission, is also encouraging both men and women across the sector to further their careers.

A positive role model, Liz has challenged the paradigm of women performing such frontline roles in the open cut coal mining industry.

Orica is proud to sponsor Mining’s Woman of the Year Award and supports a diverse and progressive work environment, with a strong focus on career development.

Liz Watts (left) with Theresa Sonneveld – Orica, Field Operations Manager South East Region

www.orica.com

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10TH ANNUAL AUSTRALIAN MINING PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS

Contribution to Mining For his technical expertise and advances in coal mining and processing Phil Enderby has won the CONTRIBUTION TO MINING AWARD.

W

ith more than 30 years’ experience under his belt, Phillip Enderby has made a significant impression on the mining and minerals processing industry.

So much so that he has been awarded the Contribution to Mining accolade at this year’s Australian Mining Prospect Awards.

The judges said the win was a result of Enderby’s ‘leading by example’ approach to management.

“Enderby has been dedicated to making mining more environmentally friendly and efficient since the start of his The judges said it was great to see someone from the technology side recognised. career, it’s great to see someone from the technology management and acted as a something Enderby said he long time and run a number side be recognised for their solid role model for younger lists as one of his proudest of plants,” he told Australefforts,” the judges com- professionals throughout his career achievements. ian Mining. mented. extensive career.

“There’s no big achieve“I think a big achieveAEnderby M 1 2 1 has 3 _ forged 0 0 0 _lastF R O 2 Mentoring 1 2 0 young 1 3 - 1 pro1 - 2 7ment, T 1 5there’s : 0 2 been : 1 3a +lot, 1 1I’ve : 0 0ment is mentoring the younging relationships with senior fessionals in the industry is worked with Glencore for a er guys and bringing them up,

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getting them up to the more senior levels.”

Described as “passionate” by his colleagues, Enderby has been recognised over the years for his ‘out of the box’ thinking and sharp problem solving skills. Leading the team at Bulga’s Coal Handling Preparation Plant, Enderby innovatively used flocculants to easily manage refuse material facilitating its disposal.

Enderby also spends a considerable amount of his time dedicated to ensuring the continued success of the mining sector, having been nominated to the position of Chairperson of the Australian Coal Association Research Program (ACARP) for the past two years. He held a committee position prior to this appointment.

He is also as a member of the ACPS.

www.miningaustralia.com.au

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10TH ANNUAL AUSTRALIAN MINING PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS

The Peoples’ Choice Australian Mining’s readers have chosen Laura Hayman as the winner of the inaugural PEOPLES’ CHOICE AWARD.

L

aura Hayman certainly knows her way around a mine site (and an airport or two) having spent the last nine years FIFO on some of Australia’s largest underground and open pit mines.

A career in mining lured the Melbournian engineer to the bright lights of Perth.

The RMIT graduate holds degrees in both Applied Geology and Geological Engineering, and recently completed her Master of Engineering Science in Mining Geomechanics at the WA School of Mines.

Adding to her list of achievements, Hayman was this year voted the winner of Australian Mining’s Peoples’ Choice award.

“It’s fantastic to be recognised for all your hard work,” Hayman said.

“Being in mining for the last ten years has certainly not been easy and one or two times I have thought of

Hayman was picked as the winner in a poll of nearly 1500 of Australian Mining’s readers.

giving it all up, but it’s nice to be recognised.”

Hayman said the biggest challenge experienced throughout her mining career has been the status and

Hayman has spent nearly a decade working as an engineer.

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lack of women on site.

“You have try and break down that barrier,” she said.

Hayman was also a finalist for the Young Professional of the Year Award and the Women in Mining Award.

With over 10 years’ experience as a Geotechnical Engineer, including five years open pit mine site work, four years underground, and one year consulting in both, Hayman has worked extensively through the Goldfields and Pilbara in W.A. Moving from underground to open pit mining she was the first female geotechnical ever on site, and soon became aware that she was a woman in a man’s world.

This has never stopped her from achieving her goals though.

After nine years working on mine sites Hayman decided she wanted to focus on mining geotechnical design work.

Hayman says over the next 12 months she hopes to become a Chartered Professional Engineer (CPEng) for both the Australian Institute of Metallurgy (AusIMM)

and the Institute of Engineers Australia (IEAust).

Earlier this year Hayman provided some handy advice for women wanting to succeed in the mining sector.

Hayman explains that building a support network within the mining industry can help support women well into the future.

“Having advice and counsel networks within your current workplace helps you to exercise sound judgement and maintain perspective,” she said.

“It is wise to commit the extra time to attend external networking forums and to seek out similar women in your company to build a support structure for each other.”

She explains that early wins go a long way towards building credibility in the mining sector.

“Entering the workforce in mining as a female and being the minority of the mining workforce, I think women are more visible and are sometimes more easily targeted for criticism,” she wrote.

“First impressions count, always do your best, and se-

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cure early wins to build your personal credibility. Organise goals with your manager in order to obtain these early wins.”

Adapting to situations and reading a worksite’s culture can help women succeed in the mining sector, Hayman says.

“Each workplace has a different set of ‘unwritten rules’ and the faster you can adapt the better off you will be,” she said.

“Identify how the organisation really works in ways such as how results are achieved, how the company promotes and give recognition to employees, how conflict is resolved, how meetings are conducted, how to gain support for critical initiatives and who are the key players.”

Hayman said getting to where she is today has taken a lot of perseverance.

“The difficult mine site workplace experiences I’ve had have been worth persevering through to get me where I am today,” she said.

“It also helps to have a clear career objective and use your support network to help plan what you need to do to get there. Doing further study is extremely worthwhile.

“Perseverance, hard work and beginning with the end in mind certainly in my experience do pay off.”

Working in mining, women can find it difficult sometimes to balance work, family and lifestyle, Hayman explains establishing a balance can take great discipline.

“I think sexist attitudes can sometimes still be encountered on mine sites and a ‘boy’s club’ mentality can exist,” she said.

“The widely used workplace code of behaviour didn’t exist when I started out as it does now, but I think the mine site workplace culture is slowly changing for the better.” www.miningaustralia.com.au

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10TH ANNUAL AUSTRALIAN MINING PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS

Explorer of the Year For making ‘hard work look like good luck’, Sheffield Resources has won EXPLORER OF THE YEAR.

E

merging minerals sands company Sheffield Resources took home this year’s Australian Mining Explorer of the Year award for its Dampier heavy minerals sands project in Western Australia.

The large zircon-rich Dampier project is located near Derby in the Canning Basin.

Sheffield said it regards Dampier as its flagship project due to its large scale, high grade, high in situ zircon content and potential to produce premium products.

In just 14 months from being granted the Dampier project tenement in September 2011, Sheffield planned and executed a maiden drilling campaign, and completed subsequent testwork and resource estimation.

The company managed to define its large, high grade Thunderbird deposit and a second, underexplored HMS occurrence named Argo.

McQuitty said Thunderbird is one of the largest high grade mineral sands deposits discovered in years.

The judges said the explorers made hard work look like good luck.

In response Sheffield managing director Bruce McQuitty said the company’s achieve-

Sheffield said nearly half of the site has less than 3m overburden.

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ments to date have been the result of a strong team.

“We’ve been very fortunate, there’s a lot of skill involved in finding these deposits and we’ve got a small and very skilled workforce,” he said.

“It’s great to win this award.”

McQuitty said Thunderbird is one of the largest and highest grade mineral sands deposits to be discovered in the last decade, with a maiden mineral resource of 1.37Bt @ 6.1% HM (Indicated & Inferred) for 83Mt of contained HM (at 2% HM cut-off).

“It’s very rich in zircon and ilmenite so we expect that it will have a major place within the minerals sand industry globally and within the Western Australian economy, should it make its way through to mining development,” he said.

This resource includes 5.7Mt of zircon, 1.3Mt of rutile, 3.6Mt of leucoxene and 24Mt of ilmenite.

The zircon product is suitable for the ceramic sector, while its primary ilmenite is suitable for sulphate TiO2 pigment manufacture,

and sulphate or chloride slag; and its secondary ilmenite, rutile and High TiO2 leucoxene is determined suitable for the welding electrode sector.

The processing of mineral sands is somewhat different to other minerals, in that each deposit lends itself to a unique permutation of conventional processing techniques.

The metallurgical testwork undertaken on the Thunderbird bulk sample in order to determine a minerals separation and processing route suited to the Thunderbird products also required innovation.

Mineral products were ultimately obtained via customisation of a sequence of conventional mineral separation plant processing techniques, including attritioning, magnetic, electrostatic and gravity separation techniques.

The Thunderbird bulk sample was deslimed using conventional cyclones and processed through a 6 stage spiral (gravity) circuit.

Heavy mineral concentrate was then upgraded to +90%HM concentrates via a two-stage wet, high-intensity magnetic separation,

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attritioning and gravity concentrate upgrade stages to produce magnetic and nonmagnetic ilmenite and zircon/high TiO2 concentrates, respectively.

McQuitty explained the Thunderbird Scoping Study is progressing on schedule and is due to be completed later this year.

“We are currently at the scoping stage on our major project, the Thunderbird Deposit, and we want to take that through to feasibility and eventually to mine but we have other projects as well that we’re chasing up so we have a very fertile project pipeline,” he said.

The deposit has favourable geometry, occurring as a thick, shallowly-dipping sheet 4km x 5km in area, extending from surface and open in most directions.

Due to the shallow dip of the deposit, approximately 40 per cent of the total resource area has less than three metres of overburden.

Sheffield has recently completed its second drilling program on the project and is looking to upgrade the resource estimate.

“We’re looking to upgrade the resource on the project as a result of that drilling and we’re moving into prefeasibility next year,” McQuitty said.

“We’re looking to take that further towards mine development perhaps in 2017 or around that timeframe.”

The results of the second drilling results, released in November continue to confirm continuity of high grade mineralisation at Thunderbird.

The 2013 drilling programme at Dampier comprised 326 holes for a total of 21,747m across the company’s Thunderbird and Argo prospects.

Sheffield Resources also took out the Best Emerging Company Award at the Diggers and Dealers forum in August. www.miningaustralia.com.au

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10TH ANNUAL AUSTRALIAN MINING PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS

Innovative Mining Solution Downhole Surveys’ drill aligner has been recognised as 2013’s INNOVATIVE MINING SOLUTION.

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D

ownhole Surveys have taken out this years’ Innovative Mining Solution Award for developing a drill aligner which cuts the time it takes to align a drill from hours to under five minutes.

After years of researching suitable gyro systems to align a drill rig, company director Mike Ayris stumbled upon an Italian-made Fibre Optic Gyro Compass (FOG) used to provide altitude and heading within the shipping industry and high speed military vessels where precise dynamic positioning is required.

Some modifications for the industry were required, such as inclusion of a lithium ion battery pack, drill rod clamp and display software which was all carried out at Downhole Surveys’ Midland workshop.

The result was a worldfirst instrument that aims to improve drilling productivity and precision.

The Azimuth Aligner sensor is placed on the drill rod at time of setup, aligning a drill rig in under five minutes compared to 1.5 hours using traditional methods.

It requires no calibration and replaces the need for a surveyor, GPS, compass, pegs or flagging tape.

Downhole Surveys adapted aligning technology from the shipping industry for drilling.

The aligner provides setup precision to 0.2 ˚ azimuth and 0.01˚ inclination without the need for surveyors or geologists.

A continual output of both azimuth and dip are displayed on a rugged monitor, allowing the driller to precisely manoeuvre the drill rig with autonomy, to the correct planned azimuth and dip.

The company says the aligner replaces the previous

The technology cuts down alignment time from hours to minutes.

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alignment method of string line and plumb bob, and addresses the age old problem of how to align a drill rig without a surveyor, in a GPS denied underground environment.

Judges said the company had taken technology from a different industry and innovated the application into setting the azimuth of a drill rig.

“This technology is used in downhole logging tools but has not been used in this application before. It has the potential save time and improve safety,” they said.

The current Azimuth Aligner model is a portable device designed to be taken on and off the drill rig at time of setup and servicing up to five drill rigs at a time.

The company says future models will see the Azimuth Aligner retrofitted to drill rigs and will become a commonly used device, similar to a GPS being fitted to a vehicle.

Originally designed for underground GPS denied environments, the Azimuth

Aligner is finding uses in remote exploration drill rig alignment where land surveyors are not available.

In the exploration sector the new technology is currently onsite at BHP Billiton’s Nickel West site, Newmont Jundee mine site, Poseidon Nickel Windarra mine site and Energy Resources Australia.

Several other sites have requested demonstrations, including Rio Tinto’s Argyle diamond mine, and Newmont Granites mine.

Three civil engineering projects have also requested demonstrations, including San Francisco Subway project, Hawks Dam, and the West Virginia rehabilitation program.

The company says Swedish drill rig manufacturer Sandvik have also viewed the new technology.

Recently the Azimuth Aligner was used on the US$1 billion Port of Miami Tunnel Project (POMT) to accurately and quickly align 100 horizontal freeze grout holes to form two emergen-

cy service passages connecting the two parallel tunnels.

The POMT involves constructing two 1.1km parallel tunnels connecting MacArthur Causeway on Watson Island and the busy Port of Miami on Dodge Island reaching 37m below sea level.

The Azimuth Aligner takes 15 minutes to determine a true north heading from power on, after which time azimuth and dip data is displayed live and continuous, allowing the driller to quickly and accurately align the drill rig, making minor adjustments as required.

A surveyor is no longer required to align the drill rig and the alignment time is cut to just 5 minutes.

Ayris said the new technology has the potential to save companies money.

“The reduction in process time is a permanent change,” he said.

“It results in the ongoing cost reductions by way of improved productivity.”

Ayris said the simplicity of the process was also beneficial for the mining sector as it tackles a multitude of tasks to complete at any one time.

“The mining sector is full of complicated processes and often the time taken to complete a particular task is not taken into consideration in the overall process,” he said.

“By simply reviewing every step and making small changes, improved efficiency will result.”

The company estimates that with 7,500 drill rigs globally, the cost of drilling in the wrong direction is estimated at $126 million.

Ayris says also says with the charge of $350 an hour to run a drill rig, applying the 1.4 hour saving created by the new aligner represents a global industry saving of $300 million per annum. www.miningaustralia.com.au

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10TH ANNUAL AUSTRALIAN MINING PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS

Excellence in Mine OH&S, Safety For the development of a rugged mobile safety shower Enware has won the EXCELLENCE IN MINE OH&S, SAFETY AWARD.

D

esigned for the roughest, remotest and toughest conditions on the planet, Enware’s Australian made safety showers and eyewash stations have been awarded the Australian Mining Excellence in Mine Safety, OH&S Award.

Enware Australia’s mobile, self-contained safety shower with inbuilt eye wash station is already a staple on the sites of many resources, engineering and project management companies across Queensland and Western The Enware team, from the small Australian manufacturer, accepting the award.

Australia.

The judges said “there are often applications where a safety shower emerged out range,” Enware said.

The safety shower helps process is undertaken, where of a military design brief, The unit is fully re- miners onsite particularly a safety show would improve the company said. charged by solar power but around shutdown work or in the safety but is not practical “Originally we had a Enware said the real benefit the instance where sites may to supply. This product over- design brief for the army, it of the self-contained shower move. comes this problem”. didn’t exist before, so we sat is that it is easily transportIt limits the costs of setforE FdevelopAThe D _ Aidea MF L E B _ 1 3 down . p d to f seeP ifa we g ecould 1 make 2 3 / 0able 1 / and 1 3 there , 9is: no 3 1mainteA M ting up critical safety equiping a mobile, solar powered it happen within the price nance required. ment as it can be brought to BB-0402 LoosenMaterial_Layout 1 1/18/13 2:52 PM Page 1

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exactly where it is needed.

“It’s great for exploration work because they aren’t permanent sites,” Enware said.

Looking ahead Enware said it will be focussing on efforts to expand export markets.

“The safety shower is one of our main components that we export overseas, it has been picked up in the Middle East, in Kuwait, Dubai and other Gulf regions,” the company said.

Featuring loading/unloading access for forklift tines or cranes the solar shower uses non-absorbent insulation to insulate its 1350L tank. The EM850 incorporates a water storage capacity to operate both emergency shower and eyewash to international safety standards conforming to both ANSI Z 358.1 2009 and AS4775-2007.

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10TH ANNUAL AUSTRALIAN MINING PROSPECT AWARDS WINNERS

Excellence in Environmental Management For its innovative dust management control system NCIG and DuPont have won the EXCELLENCE IN ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT AWARD.

F

or the implementation of an integrated dust management system at the Port of Newcastle, the Newcastle Coal Infrastructure Group and DuPont have taken out this year’s Excellence in Environmental Management award.

In 2004, six mining companies joined to form NCIG with the objective being to increase port capacity.

The NCIG coal terminal is located on Kooragang Island in the Port of Newcastle, the world’s leading exporter of coal.

NCIG exports mainly thermal coal from the Newcastle, Hunter Valley, Gloucester, Gunnedah and Wester Coalfields to destinations around the world.

With the NCIG terminal in close proximity to a number of industrial and residential suburbs, the group says they recognised the importance of dust management from the onset – noting that it was critical to ensure a social licence to operate remained intact.

With NCIG being a purposely designed and built coal shipping terminal, most of the capabilities for good dust management were already taken into considera-

The NCIG and DuPont teams accepting the award for the innovative dust control system in Newcastle.

tion and included in the plant such as: enclosed conveyors and transfers; belt cleaning systems; water sprays throughout the site; moisture analysers; weather stations, and real time dust monitors.

However NCIG say they recognised the importance of all these systems working in tangent, and decided to implement an automated smart system that controlled all the capabilities in a holistic manner.

The aim was to eliminate

technologies operating in silos and take away the subjective judgement of operators.

DuPont were engaged by NCIG as export consultants to assist with the development and implementation of industry leading dust management practices, technologies, and systems at the newest terminal in operation at the Port of Newcastle.

The major project examined all the major operations on site and the key factors that influence dust

The system uses multiple applications in real time to suppress and control dust.

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generation and emission and developed specific strategies and systems to address the issues in an integrated and holistic approach.

For coal terminals some of the main factors of dust generation are materials handling, weather, and moisture balance and control.

The project started in late 2011 and reviewed all dust related equipment, dust mitigation procedures, and air quality systems including coal receival, transfer points, conveyors, stockyard, stacking, reclaiming, and ship loading.

The end result is a fully automated dust management system that is reactive, predictive and, proactive.

The Integrated Dust Management System (IDMS) takes into account fixed variables such as the location of the site in relation to surrounding suburbs and coal properties and also changing variables such as weather conditions; realtime dust levels; locations of coal in the yard; changing moisture level in the coal stockpiles due to weather and evaporation; and the potential risk to neighbour-

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ing communities as a result.

Based on the level of risk identifies, the IDMS is able to respond reactively by sending out alarms and initiates critical dust mitigation action such as activation of dust suppression sprays for different parts of the site.

The system is also predictive and able to determine the dust risks faced by the site in advance, alerting personal so dust mitigation actions can be applied proactively.

Before the project was initiated and under the old dust management system there were occasions where the adverse weather conditions such as ambient temperatures above 30 degrees celsius, relative humidity below 20 per cent and wind speeds above 12m/s generated dust emission levels that caused complaints from the community.

However since the implementation the company says similar days of adverse weather has shown that while there was a small increase in the airborne dust levels, the difference was less than a tenth of what it had been.

The judges stated that the “forward thinking” dust management system deployed by NCIG and DuPont should be implemented at other ports.

Nathan Juchau, Health, Safety, Environment and Community Manager at NCIG said the award would mean a lot to his team who had worked hard to implement the initiative.

“It’s a great recognition of the effort that gone into the work and it will be nice to get back on site and let the people who have been involved with it know that it has all paid off,” Jachau said.

Juchau said NCIG was continually working towards ensuring dust management at the site was handled above and beyond best practice. www.miningaustralia.com.au

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LOOK BACK

What happened to 2013?

Alex Heber takes a look at the year that was, and what it meant for miners.

T

here’s no sugar coating it, it’s been a tough year for the mining sector.

After years of boom time activity, 2013 has seen thousands of job losses, expenditure budgets cut, profit downgrades announced, and major projects shelved.

The biggest job cuts have been made in the country’s gold and coal mines, with contractors servicing the sector copping much the brunt.

On the whole commodity prices have stabilised, however the coal sector is still doing it tough with high cost Australian projects suffering margin squeeze, competing with lower cost projects overseas, pushing miners to wield the job cutting axe on their workforces.

Over two months coal miner Peabody Energy 42

December 2013

slashed about 800 positions across its New South Wales and Queensland operations, blaming challenging market conditions for the move.

Many coal mines in Anglo American’s Queensland portfolio have also been affected by falling coal prices over the last 12 months with the company announcing it would cut coking coal production in response to weakening demand.

In November the company cut 200 contractor jobs at its Dawson coal mine in Queensland.

Dawson mine General Manager, Aaron Puna at the time said sliding coal prices are squeezing the mine’s profitability.

In June the company put its Aquila coal mine into care and maintenance, stating the operation was no

AustralianMining

longer viable.

As sure as supply and demand laws are, the demand for mining jobs has gone through the roof with a number of miners and contractors reporting astounding amounts of job applications, in April Barminco said it had received over 1800 applications for 131 positions.

In November, New Emerald Coal advertised for about 120 different positions at its newly acquired Blair Athol mine, after just a week the company said it had received 1100 applications.

The gold price tumbled in April, hitting a three-year low in June falling below the $US1250 an ounce mark At the time the gold bears said April’s price drop was just the beginning, predicting the bullion market

to continue to plummet to around $900 an ounce, a figure that would render many of Australia’s gold mines unviable.

Emerging gold producer Northern Star Resources managing director Bill Beament bucked the trend of downbeat gold miners at this year’s Diggers and Dealers conference, saying the gold price is “fantastic”, telling Australian Mining “two years ago we were jumping around in Kalgoorlie here singing its praises, and it’s the same price”.

Reacting to the lower gold price Barrick cut over 200 jobs globally and finalised the sale of its Yilgarn South assets in a $US270 million deal struck with South African company Gold Fields.

Barrick has also flagged

it will cut $US2 billion from its capex and costs across the organisation, saying it will be implementing budget discipline, focussing on investor returns and further portfolio optimisation.

It also earmarked its WA Plutonic gold mine for potential divestment, warning “returns will drive production; production will not drive returns”.

Arguably one of the biggest deals to come out of 2013 was Swiss commodities group Glencore’s takeover of resource company Xstrata.

The newly merged miner quickly moved to shelve the $7 billion Wandoan coal project in Queensland and said it is squeezing $US2 billion out of synergies created by the $US34 billion Continued on page 44 www.miningaustralia.com.au

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LOOK BACK

Continued from page 42

all-share acquisition deal which was finalised in April, making GlencoreXstrata the biggest mining company in the world.

The company has already reduced its Australian coal mine workforce by 11 per cent and boosted productivity by 21 per cent over the past year, axing 450 people from its Newlands and Oaky Creek mines, shutting its Brisbane office, and dumping plans to develop a $1 billion coal export terminal on Balaclava Island, 40 kilometres south of Rockhampton in Queensland.

Despite a year marred by headlines of job cuts there have been a few projects to come online.

In September AngloGold Ashanti’s Tropicana gold mine produced first gold ahead of schedule and on budget.

“To pour gold ahead of schedule and within budget is a rare feat in this industry, and it’s a significant milestone for us and Independence Group, our partner,” AngloGold Ashanti VP for Australia, group planning and technical Graham Ehm said.

Sandfire Resources also officially launched its DeGrussa copper mine in WA and Rio Tinto’s Kestrel South mine is now open for business, producing first coal in July.

But Rio Tinto energy boss Harry Kenyon-Slaney warned there are still tough times ahead for the coal sector, explaining cost control is imperative.

On the whole it has been a year of expenditure cuts amongst the top tier miners, with the era of conservative mining majors well and truly upon us.

This year has brought with it a changing of the guard at the helm of major miners, with Rio, BHP, and Anglo American among those with new bosses.

Combined Rio and BHP Billiton set a target to take $10 billion out of their operating costs the next two years.

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December 2013

The Glencore and Xstrata merger was one of the biggest deals for the year, but swiftly lead to the cancellation of unprofitable expansions.

The new heads of mining are embarking on a new era of slashing costs with BHP moving to cut spending by 18 per cent in the 2014 budget.

BHP chief executive Andrew Mackenzie has said “substantial” cuts will also be made in 2015 and 2016.

Rio Tinto boss Sam Walsh announced earlier this year that the company will execute a raft of cost saving measures, promising a new regime with “unrelenting focus on pursuing value for shareholders,” including tightening up project protocols and overall capital expenditure.

Transitioning out of an investment phase where the focus was on getting tonnes out of the ground at any cost and building new projects, mining companies are now focussing on production,

AustralianMining

A rationalisation occurred in gold mining, as prices fell from historic highs. www.miningaustralia.com.au

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LOOK BACK

productivity and technology improvements – especially as new projects come online.

Contractors have been hit especially hard by the transition; with fewer projects on the horizon competition is high.

Walsh said the company hit peak investment in 2012 and is now focused on building cash reserves with the sale of non-core assets.

True to his word, Rio offloaded its 80 per cent stake in the Northparkes copper mine to China Molybdenum for $US820 million, handed over the keys to its Blair Athol coal mine, and flagged that its stake in Coal and Allied and Clermont mine were also up for sale.

With its eyes on the bottom line, the miner also ripped out about 800 jobs, signing a $100 million back office outsourcing deal with US technology company IBM in October.

Automation and robotics have played a big role in mining this year with giants like Rio and BHP implementing driverless trucks and trains in the Pilbara, Western Australia.

Earlier this year Rio moved its 100 millionth tonne using automated trucks, which have clocked up more than one million kilometres.

Rio said it is aiming to have more than 40 trucks operating autonomously across three sites in the Pilbara by early next year.

In a move to reduce contractor spending, BHP fast tracked the modernisation of its iron ore division, launching its new remote operation centre in Perth.

Such milestones prove automation is here to stay; its importance in the new mining landscape is becoming increasingly clear as miners attempt to improve productivity and reduce costs.

Defying investor expectations, iron ore prices have been relatively stable throughout 2013.

After plummeting to $US86.7 a tonne last year, iron ore has risen steadily to above $130 a tonne, helped along nicely by the Australwww.miningaustralia.com.au

Iron ore defied the analysts’ forecasts for the year, and made a recovery, growing during the typical slow period for the metal.

ian dollar falling below parity with the US dollar and China’s move to restock inventory levels.

Port Hedland also posted a number of record export months, peaking at 25.2 million in October with the port’s general manager John Finach stating that “we’re expecting further targets, uptrends for the next year and we’re forecasting about 320 million tonnes of port throughput for the 2013/ 2014 financial year”.

Mining’s big personalities have also featured heavily in the headlines this year with Gina Rinehart feuding with her children, Clive Palmer running in the Federal election, and Andrew ‘Twiggy’ Forrest making one of the largest single philanthropic donations in Australian history.

Activism has been another hot topic in the Australian mining sector this year with boisterous protests from the likes of the now infamous Jonathan Moylan who tem-

porarily wiped more than $314 million off the value of Whitehaven Coal with a fake ANZ press release.

Coal was the worst hit commodity over the year, with the majority of layoffs and workforce reductions carried out in this sector, with gold a close second as the industry Australiawide shrank as mining shifted into a production phase.

The emergence of Coal Seam Gas projects, particularly in New South Wales, have also come up against protests with one gas company executive recognising the CSG sector has an image problem and didn’t fully gauge the levels of opposition it would receive.

But CSG is garnering support from the top with Federal Minister for Industry Ian Macfarlane an-

nouncing in October that he is for CSG and will not tolerate anarchy around CSG protests.

Within one day of being elected Prime Minister Tony Abbott announced his government will “reboot” mining and scrap the mining and carbon taxes.

The mining tax has been arguably laughable raising not even half of the Labor government’s forecasted $3 billion in the first 12 months.

In August it was revealed Rio’s mining tax payment amounted to zero for the first year of the tax.

Draft legislation to abolish the mining tax was released in October.

Running on the promise to streamline mining approvals, Abbott’s ‘one-stopapprovals shop’ policy is coming to life with Western Australia, Queensland and New South Wales all announcing plans to reform the mining approvals process, removing duplication and cutting red tape.

It’s been a tough year for

the country’s mining nursery, with SNL Metal Economics research suggesting global exploration budgets are down almost 30 per cent this year.

Major miners recorded a 24 per cent drop in exploration spend.

But juniors took a bigger hit, with exploration budgets falling 39 per cent over 2012.

Contract driller Ausdrill halved its profit forecast in November and drilling company Boart Longyear reported suffering a 35 per cent fall in revenue year on year, for the first half of 2013.

In October, Queensland’s exploration scorecard reflected a difficult year for the state’s explorers with minerals exploration falling 31 per cent to $732 million for 2012-13.

But in the same week it was reported the Queensland government which is working to streamline the approvals process, granted 1400 exploration permits in seven days.

AustralianMining

December 2013

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METALS OUTLOOK 2014

The 2014 Metals Outlook Copper

Copper has an interesting future ahead in the coming years.

Australian Mining has previously gone into detail about the future of copper, looking at it long term and how the sector will develop in the coming years.

It sits in an interesting position of being a mature industry that still has a bright production future ahead.

However growth rates are slowing, which is all part of the global shift, and in particular an Australian shift, from the ramp-up investment heavy construction phase into an era of production, just in time to utilise a predicted upswing in demand for copper.

According to IBISWorld reports industry revenue is expected to increase by 5.1 per cent to $7.8 billion in 2013-14 as increased output is offset lower Australian dollar copper prices.

IBISWorld explained that “industry revenue is expected to continue to grow over the five years through to 2018-19 reflecting increases in copper ore output, a decline in the value off the Australian dollar and rising US dollar copper prices”.

It went on, going into greater detail, stating that “overall industry revenue is expected to grow by an annualised rate of 1.8 per cent over the five years from 2014-15 through to 2018-19, to total $8.5 billion”, which, despite being in growth, is a dramatic slow from the annualised growth rates of 7.5 per cent experienced between 2009-14.

However in the short term it may be too soon for a surplus.

According to French bank Natixis, if one goes only by the level of copper stocks held in exchange warehouses, which it defines as those belonging to the LME, SHFE and Comex, then it does look like the market is in surplus, as these stocks have risen by about 110,000 tonnes since the beginning of the year.

“Anecdotal reports suggest that stocks of copper held at bonded warehouses in China peaked at somewhere between 1 million and 1.1 million tonnes in January, and have since fallen to a low of little more than 300,000 tonnes. Netting off 110,000 tonnes of higher exchange stocks versus 700-800,000 tonnes of lower bonded stocks suggests a substantial deficit,” it stated.

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An insight into the coming year and how the industry will progress. Cole Latimer and IBISWorld report.

IBISWorld also pointed to a coming decrease next year as mining shifts into its next phase, with “revenue expected to decrease by .02 per cent in 2014-15 as mine construction of expansion activities start to be ramped up,” adding that “during this mine expansion the focus off the industry is likely to be on construction activities rather than production, leading to a slight drop in revenue”.

However this is only for the short term. Once these operations come online fully they are predicted to dramatically increase output.

Next year will see the .02 per cent decrease, however the following year in 2015-16 revenues will leap at a rate of 4 per cent growth, expanding again the in 2017-18 period to 5.7 per cent.

It is highly unlikely that the sector will ever see the annaulised growth in revenue that it did in 2006-7, where it grew at a rate of 34 per cent.

Yet, this increase in mine output will not be matched by smelting and refinery production, IBISWorld says, which will lift the exports of unrefined copper.

“Exports of unrefined copper will expand strongly in 2016-17 due to the planned closure of GlencoreXstrata’s copper smelting and refining operations in Queensland.

The forecast: Next year will dip for copper, but the metal will come back with strong growth and soon stabilise.

Gold

Gold was the darling of the investment set over the past few years, so will we see this again?

While iron ore was making its mark in Australia and captivating the nation with its seemingly never ending climb, gold itself was skyrocketing in price and reaching new highs, having climbed consistently and rapidly since 2006 and not even slowing its ascent for the global financial crisis.

IBISWorld explained that “investors across the world flocked to gold as a safe monetary asset as the value of the global financial assets and currency tumbled; this sudden increase in demand caused global gold prices to surge”.

Gold rose and finally settled at a peak of $1730 per ounce in September 2011, dipping slightly before seeing a late resurgence a year later in October 2012 to reach $1700 again before sliding off once more.

This period has been the first since the 2007-8 that gold’s growth in revenue has actively shrunk, with a 2.2 per cent decline in revenue.

Next year the story gets worse, with a predicted double digit decline in revenue generation, shrinking 10.2 per cent.

This recent negativity has already played out across the sector with many gold miners cutting jobs or scaling back expansions and operations to rationalise.

From next year through to 2019 there is a predicted annual growth

rate of revenue of only 2 per cent, a marked difference from the period leading up to 2014, which saw an annual growth rate of 5.4 per cent.

Much of this is down to improving economic conditions globally.

High production costs coupled with high wages (which in turn drove up production costs again) are making many of these gold mines which were able to draw a profit during the boom now unviable.

Add to this the uncertainty created in investor circles by complex regulatory systems as well as increases in state royalty taxes, and a financial storm engulfing the sector has surprised no one.

However not all are painting a grim story for gold in the short term.

Former Rio Tinto executive Owen Hegarty said gold is moving in only one direction - up.

Speaking at the Gold Symposium forum in Sydney, Hegarty said demand from China is “unstoppable” and Australia will be playing “catch up” to deal with a “supply problem” for years to come.

Hegarty explained physical gold supply hasn’t been able to keep up with “sensational demand” which is “led by China and followed by India”.

China’s growing middle class and urbanisation will see growth continue for several decades to come, Hegarty said.

“They’re going to maintain Continued on page 48 www.miningaustralia.com.au

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METALS OUTLOOK 2014

Continued from page 46

growth at between seven and eight per cent for the whole of the life of this leadership,” he said.

Hegarty said as big miners continue to shelve and talk down new projects the gap between supply and demand will only be accentuated.

“Supply is going to continue to be the issue, we are going to be playing catch up football on the supply side,” Hegarty said.

“We need continue to work hard at reducing regulatory constraints.”

With a new government in charge, it is now unknown what constraints may stay in place regulatory wise, and which will be lifted, with Australian Mining being Iron ore will again drive mining upwards, as China steel demand increases. told by one industry executive that “even with the mining tax gone and revenue change wise next year, with due to the forecast squeeze on globthe genie back in the bottle, it still a 4.2 per cent growth in revenues, al nickel supplies, particularly as the hurts the sector, as that genie can be before facing a slide downwards higher grade, easier to process nickel pulled back out at any time”. again towards eventual contraction sulphide supply swindles.

On the production side the news of revenues in 2018-19, despite the “Nickel laterites and nickel pig is much brighter, even though a pre- increase in output. iron are not capable of filling this suldicted rise in worldwide supply is phide void at a time [when]the metal Nickel forecast to constrain wider growth. is increasingly being recognised and “Australia’s gold production is The nickel industry has always sought for its strategic application expected to increase over the five been one of sharp busts and booms, in stainless steel and other products years through to 2018-19”, adding with the busts now lasting longer with extraordinary performance that “significant contributions will and longer. characteristics,” Belladonna said.

To sum up the sector in a single be made by the Tropicana joint venDue to this “industry perforture project involving AngloGold word - volatile. mance is expected to improve during After an astounding leap in rev- the five years through to 2017-18, Ashanti and Independence Group which will yield 320 000 to 350 000 enues in 2006-07, where it skyrock- with revenue rising at an annualised troy ounces at full production; the eted 132.9 per cent after shrinking rate of 5.2 per cent to total $3.13 bilcontinued ramp-up of Newcrest’s 5.7 per cent the previous year, nickel lion in 2017-18,” IBISWorld stated.

Cadia East mine (which will add has undergone a series of sharp price This will be driven by trends in 700 000 troy ounces at full produc- corrections, seeing an annualised fall US dollar nickel prices, the value of tion), Mungana Goldmine’s Chilla- of 12.1 per cent in revenues from the Australian dollar, and the volgoe project (160 00 troy ounces); 2008 through to this year. ume of nickel production.

This was due to prices retreating and Tanami Gold’s Central Tanami IBISWorld expanded up on Belproject (160 000 troy ounces)” de- from unsustainably high levels. ladonna’s forecast for the metal, However after two years of se- adding that “growing steel demand spite recent lay-offs.

This massive increase from a rious gloom for the sector, follow- in key consuming countries such as number of large players is expected ing another brief spike in 2010-11, China will lift demand for nickel, to push Australia’s gold output from nickel is predicted to grow again, putting upward pressure on nickel around 252.5 tonnes currently to according to IBISWorld reports. prices; although global output of A M tonnes 0 9 1 3in_ 2018-19.

0 0 0 _ J EA 1 Western 2 0 1 3Areas - 0 8CFO - 2 Joe 8 T Belladonna 1 5 : 2 6 : 0 nickel 5 + 1 is 0 expected : 0 0 268.1 to be sufficient to Gold is likely to see its best year explained that this is mostly likely meet demand, more production will

come from higher cost laterite ore, in turn putting a floor under nickel prices”.

However it did note that nickel output is expected to grow more slowly, reflecting producer caution due to nickel’s historic volatility, which will result in reduced stocks and in turn upward pressures on price.

Earlier this year Glencore was forced to write down billions in Xstrata nickel assets, writing down its US$ 5billion Koniambo venture in New Caledonia after Xstrata last year closed its Cosmos nickel mine.

Approximately two thirds of nickel exported from Australia heads to China, with Canada accounting for the remainder.

Belladonna pointed to 2015 as the pinch point for quality nickel sulphides, forcing the industry to look to lower grade deposits and new technology to meet demand.

“Technological advances in nickel processing [will allow] previously uneconomic deposits to be mined, with mixed success,” IBISWorld explained.

However the truth for the metal is unavoidable, according to IBISWorld: “The nickel ore mining industry is declining.”

Iron ore

Iron ore spent the last few years as the darling of the mining boom.

It was also the main factor in the rapid decline of the boom as prices spiralled quickly, taking much of the investor confidence with it.

This in turn dragged the rest of the industry down as investors rapidly departed. But now it has seen a revival and stabilisation, so where will the sector head now?

Upwards, according to IBISWorld, iron ore miners, and analysts.

“Following a large revenue decline in 2012-13 due to price falls, Continued on page 50

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METALS OUTLOOK 2014

Continued from page 48

industry revenue is expected to rebound in 2013-14 by 13.6 per cent to $67.2 billion on higher output and price increases,” IBISWorld said.

“This will be despite increases in iron ore output worldwide and slower economic growth in developed and developing economics.”

JPMorgan also saw positive forecasts for 2014, stating that it is unlikely to tumble like 2012.

In Australia we’ve already begun to see this revival as Australian iron ore miners added another $65 billion to their value over the last half of the financial year at a time when the sector typically expects price to fall.

Mount Gibson Iron was up 111 per cent since June 30, Arrium climbed 93 per cent and Fortescue Metals Group rose 92 per cent, while Port Hedland posted a number of record months, peaking at 25.2 million in October with the port’s general manager John Finach stating that “we’re expecting further targets, uptrends for the next year and we’re forecasting about 320 million tonnes of port throughput for the 2013/ 2014 financial year”.

China has played a major part in this upswing, with Deutsche Bank strategist Xiao Fu explaining that China has been restocking after record levels of iron ore imports over the past few months “We expect the pace of restocking could slow; however, we are still below the 2011-12 (inventory) peaks, which suggests that the restocking cycle could last for another two or three months,” he said.

Fortescue Metals Group chief Nev Power said iron ore inventories at Chinese ports have been limited for many months, meaning purchasing has to go on to keep the steel mills going.

A“We M 1 2don’t 1 3 see _ 0 the 0 0same _ P EenvironL ment that created last year’s drop,”

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Power said at the Diggers & Dealers conference in Kalgoorlie earlier this year.

“There were very high stocks in both the steel mills and the ports last year, and this year we are seeing below average port and mill stocks,” he said.

IBISWorld stated that in 201314 industry profit is estimated to be around $20 billion, with the industry forecast to generate about 2.8 per cent of Australia’s GDP”.

“The industry is expected to continue growing strongly over the next five years through 2018-19, as production volumes increase and prices stabilise then decline to boost demand.”

It went on to state that although we have seen an annualised growth Gold is expected to continue its decline in to next year. rate of 13.6 per cent for 2013-14, following a decline of 10.6 per cent US $125 in 2013, with further US dollar prices for silver, lead, and in 2012-13, we will see a continued falls forecast through 2019 to US zinc, and a weaker Australian dollar,” IBISWorld states in its report growth rate over the coming years $106.71 per dry tonne.” of 6.3 per cent for 2014-15 which However Credit Suisse had a on the sector.

“Industry revenue is expected to will leap again to 9.1 per cent in gloomier outlook for the commod2015-16, but will not, in the next ity’s immediate price future, stating rise at an annualised rate of 2.8 per five years, reach into double digit that it will dip to around US$ 115 cent, eventually reaching $5.5 bilgrowth again. per tonne by the end of this year, lion in 2017-18.”

However there are hurdles to At the height of the boom iron and may even fall as low as US$ 90 overcome in the short term, IBISore recorded a growth rate of 56.4 by the end of 2014. per cent.

Ongoing skills shortages will World explaining that “the price of As touched on by analysts and continue to push up wage rates, silver is expected to fall slightly in miners, iron ore is tied to Chinese adding to the sector’s pain and 2012-13 - this trend is a threat to the industry”. demand and will be heavily influ- shorting profits.

On the opposite side of the specenced by their steel trends as well as trum zinc and lead prices are expectprice negotiations with the Japanese. Silver, Zinc, and Lead However, overall “industry out- Silver lead and zinc appear to have ed to trend upwards.

China is the world’s largest conput is still expected to increase at an been some of the few metals not to sumer of refined zinc, and accounts annualised 6.7 per cent in the five benefit from the mining boom.

From the start of the turn around for nearly half of zinc used globally. years through 2018-19 to 88.37 milin metals through to the height and Luckily for zinc this demand lion tonnes”.

“A weaker Australian dollar is eventual decline of the boom, these from China will continue to grow.

Overall growth will occur next also expected to benefit domestic three metals saw an annualised deyear, with a 3.8 per cent jump in miners over iron ore producers in cline of 6.1 per cent.

However a major turnaround is revenues, a 8.8 per cent increase the other countries.” following year, after which the inDespite this prices are not look- predicted for the sector.

“Industry performance is ex- dustry is predicted to stabilise at an ing overly optimistic.

“After peaking at an average pected to improve over the five annual growth rate of 2.5 per cent 1 of 2US 0 1$167.76 3 - 1 1 per - 1 tonne 5 T 1 in 2 : 2011, 1 7 : 1 years 1 + 1 through 1 : 0 0 2017-18 due to the for two years and then experience a global iron prices slipped to around interplay of higher output, firmer dip of 4.9 per cent in 2017-18.

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Pelican Products Pty Ltd • Suite 2.33 West Wing, Platinum Building • 4 Ilya Avenue, Erina NSW 2250 Tel: +612 4367 7022 • Fax: +612 4367 7066 • www.pelicanaustralia.com infoAustralia@pelican.com All trademarks are registered and/or unregistered trademarks of Pelican Products, Inc., its subsidiaries and/or affiliates.

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www.miningaustralia.com.au

FOX3937_B[CLHESJ].pdf

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You’ll feel at home onsite with a Foxtel box in every room.

Foxtel’s Mining & Workforce Accommodation Platinum package delivers a bounty of channels and the control of a set-top box in every room. For mining and workforce accommodation personnel staying at Cherratta Lodge or Gap Ridge in north-western WA, it’s entertainment they can enjoy like their family and friends back home.

Brian Linklater, Manager at Cherratta Lodge in the Pilbara, told us installing Foxtel’s Mining & Workforce Accommodation Platinum package was about making his property stand out to guests and potential new clients.

“We use Foxtel to shine above our competitors and differentiate ourselves in the market,” says Linklater.

Cherratta Lodge has over 300 rooms across three properties. And the Mining & Workforce Accommodation Platinum package offers their guests a set-top box in every room, giving them the power to pause, rewind or record live TV. With over 80 channels, there’s everything from sports, to drama and movies, to dedicated news, lifestyle and documentary channels.

It’s entertainment that helps the remote workforce unwind and stay connected with the world from the heart of the Pilbara.

Foxtel’s Mining & Workforce Accommodation Platinum package perfectly compliments Cherratta Lodge’s range of recreational facilities.

“We also have feeds installed in public areas such as the dining rooms, gyms, and by the pool,” says Linklater. It’s a balance that keeps both his guests and staff happy.

And just as Linklater planned, Foxtel’s Mining & Workforce Accommodation Platinum package has already helped Cherratta Lodge stand out, “We have only had Platinum for 2½ months but already it has been very well received. Foxtel has helped us gain new clients and we’re very happy with it.”

Gap Ridge, operated by Sodexo, is a larger, 2000+ room purpose-built mining accommodation property five minutes from Karratha, WA. They offer guests Foxtel’s Mining & Workforce Accommodation Standard package with access to 35 channels, the ability to pause, rewind and record live TV, as well as a set-top box in every room. It’s a goldmine of entertainment.

Assistant Project Manager Prakash Seenarain explains: “We want to ensure that guests have access to a broad range of viewing options including popular entertainment and movie channels and access to the best in sports programming.”

NBA

Foxtel is not available in some areas/all premises. Equipment will vary based on location: MyStar HD provided in Foxtel areas serviced by Austar. Foxtel marks are used under licence by Foxtel Management Pty Limited. FOX3937_AM

Seenarain believes providing his guests with the best in live sport is crucial to beating the feeling of isolation remote workers feel working away from friends, family and the comforts of home. Foxtel’s Mining & Workforce Accommodation Standard package allows his guests to follow their favourite teams – no matter which code they follow.

“It is important to keep people feeling connected, and having access to the games of their favourite AFL, NRL and EPL teams makes all the difference.”

And crucially for any mining or civil projects utilising a remote FIFO workforce, connected staff means less staff attrition and greater efficiency.

Get a Mining & Workforce Accommodation package today, call Foxtel Business on 03 8325 3159.

2013/14 Hyundai A-League Season

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HYDRAULICS & PNEUMATICS

STOPPING safety problems W

ith injuries result- the line in brake failure and ing from vehicle threatening safety of workaccidents a serious ers on site down the line. issue on site, the need for safThe hydraulic brakes er hydraulic brakes is rising. also suffer from minimal Advanced Braking Tech- wear due to their lower opnology (ABT) have devel- erating temperatures as the oped a new hydraulic wet brake rotors run in a bath of braking system which not oil that cools the brake duronly prevents vehicle runa- ing operation. ways and aids stopping, but “An innovative fail safe are also up to the challeng- feature of the brake is the ing demands of the mine site spring applied hydraulic environment. release park brake system The new brakes, known functioning as an integrated as the sealed integrated brak- park and emergency brake,” ing system (SIBS), are an the company stated.

Australian development that This ensures that the veare fully enclosed, single ro- hicle can not roll away untor, high speed hydraulic wet expectedly or undergo any brakes. uncontrolled vehicle moveAccording to ABT, as ments. the SIBS brakes are fully en“This feature provides an closed they are no longer ex- unprecedented level of safety posed to environmental con- of vehicle operators and site taminants typically found personnel.” on site such as dust, water, Advanced Braking Techand mud, that AM 1 2 1which 3 _ 0can’t 0 0 _penM A T nology . p d f stated Pa g e the 1 SIBS 6 / 1 etrate the brakes, and down brakes can be easily adapted

Braking the cycle of problems of safety on site

to any make of light vehi- manager for ABT’s mining cle, while the SIBS Driveline division, said the brakes have Brakes, for heavy vehicles, been stringently tested and protects the larger sized ma- validated.

“SIBS 1chines. / 1 3 , 9 : 1 3 : 3 5 AM A E D T brakes are deMartin Johnston, general signed and certified to ex-

acting ADR requirements, and consistently outlast the vehicles they are fitted to, unlike conventional drum and disc brakes,” Johnston explained.

MATO Australia Pty Ltd Conveyor Belt Maintenance Equipment PH: +(61) 1300 850 795 FAX: +(61) 2 4936 1388 Email: maus@mato.com.au www.mato.com.au

Belt Cleaners

• Primary Belt Cleaners • Secondary Belt Cleaners • Returns Belt Cleaners

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MATO Lag

• Available in Natural and FRAS Grade Rubber • FRAS Testing as per AS 1334.10-1994, & AS 1334-9-1982

Belt Accessories Belt Cleaners • Belt Cutters • Belt Clamps • Belt Trackers

• Primary Belt Cleaners • Secondary Belt Cleaners • Returns Belt Cleaners

www.miningaustralia.com.au

AM0913_000_SAU

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MAKING MODERN LIVING POSSIBLE

Sauer-Danfoss is now Danfoss

The experts you know, the service you rely on Only the name has changed Sauer-Danfoss now provides your off-highway machines with advanced hydraulic solutions under a new name – Danfoss. We’ll still be in your local area, providing the technical expertise and service you depend on.

In Danfoss Power Solutions – a fully integrated Danfoss business segment – you’ll now have a stronger partner with solid foundations and even more focus on innovation.

1

strong global brand

joining our hydraulic experts with a company committed to engineering excellence since 1933

powersolutions.danfoss.com

AM1213_054

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MAINTENANCE & MONITORING

Bolt removal

and thread refurbishment

A new 4-axis CNC milling machine is increasing safety on site

A

new machine has been developed to precisely extract bolts and refurbish threads more safely.

Hydratight has released geniSYS II, a highly portable 4-axis CNC milling machine that is capable of accurately removing cracked or broken studs as well as the precise refurbishment of damaged threads without the need for manually controlled drilling or metal disintegration techniques.

Importantly, by removing the need for manually controlled drilling it also removes the potential risk of hand injury during bolt removal. According to Hydratight’s commercial leader for Australia, Neil Ferguson, “geniSYS II is entirely computer controlled, providing desired results in a safe and

controlled manner, across a range of bolt extraction and threading applications. This includes work on recirculation pumps, turbine cases, heat exchangers, motor bases and many more high impact assets”.

“Full CNC operation allows for accurate and repeatable machining while the motion control command center provides the ultimate in performance monitoring and technician safety.”

The machine features a 452.1 millimetre depth of cut to handle demanding thread and boring applications; a 3-axis CNC control capability to perform bolt extraction and thread refurbishment in a single set up; and has high tolerance profile rails to provide consistent results while all three axes use precision-ground

ball screws for increased precise movement of the mill head. The machine also comes with motion control software for detailed real time feedback on tool positioning.

“Hydratight’s geniSYS II is available complete with 3-axis mill assembly, motion control package, all required bits and extensions, optional voltage converter, all in a single – easy to deploy – rugged shipping/storage container,” Ferguson added.

“The introduction of the new tool complements Hydratight’s range of on-site in-situ milling and machining services, users of which include companies involved in maintenance programmes to tight deadlines that often can’t afford the time to dismantle heavy plant to take it off-site for servicing.”

Features a 452.1 mm depth of cut for demanding applications.

Industrial equipment cleaning centres

K

ärcher has opened new ser- staple overseas, in Europe, Asia, the opportunity to showcase everything vice centres for industrial Americas, and the Middle East, it is that we have to offer,” Callinan said. cleaning. a first for Australia.

“There is a Kärcher product for According to the company it is Andrew Callinan, Kärcher Aus- every cleaning application, whether “opening these new centres Austral- tralia’s professional business man- for the work site or office; now we ia wide to provide both current and ager, said the centres are an exam- are able to showcase them all in one future users the opportunity to view ple of the leading innovation that place.

A trial M 1 1the 1 3 _ 0 0Kärcher 0 _ Q Urange”.

I 1 Kärcher 2 0 1 is 3 known - 1 0 - for”.

0 9 T 1 4 : 2 0 : 1 4 +“This 1 1 : also 0 0 represents our comand entire Whilst these centres have been a “The centres give us the unique mitment to our customers; we

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are dedicated to bringing a more unique, in-depth and friendly experience to their next piece of cleaning equipment.”

The centres are opening in Brisbane, Adelaide, Perth, the Gold Coast, and Sydney, with plans to open in Newcastle and Melbourne also on the agenda.

www.miningaustralia.com.au

AM1213_000_VEY

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THE PEOPLE WHO MAKE THE BEST CONVEYOR BELTS NOW ALSO

SERVICE THEM. Whether your mining operation is surface or underground, Veyance now offers a complete range of service, repairs and maintenance for all types of conveyor belts.

• Belt installation • Splicing • Scanning • Belt repairs • Pulley lagging • Condition monitoring Because we’re a total service provider, Veyance will also deliver full certified trained technicians. We believe prevention is the key to lowest cost per tonne conveying, which is why we offer regular maintenance checks to help keep you running in peak condition. Our Veyance Services network is now operational in Mackay and Karratha and will soon to be up and running in the Hunter Valley.

Learn how to speak the language of the belts at: www.goodyearep.com Mackay 0408 292 538

Karratha 0429 728 703

The GOODYEAR (and Winged Foot Design) trademark is used by Veyance Technologies, Inc. under license from The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company.

Goodyear Engineered Products are manufactured and sourced exclusively by Veyance Technologies, Inc. or its affiliates. ©2011 Veyance Technologies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

14308 A4+ AM

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MINING JOBS

To advertise a new job contact Hussein Azzan at 02 8484 0852

To see the latest jobs available visit www.miningaustralia.com.au, which is updated daily.

SENIOR MINING ENGINEER/ALTERNATE UNDERGROUND MANAGER We are currently recruiting an experienced Senior Mining Engineer to join us at our Southern Operations.

Reporting to the Mining Manager the purpose of this role is to provide operational direction, input and advice for the safe mining of the resource while ensuring its compliance to the prescribed mine plan.

In this role your key responsibilities include monitoring day to day operational issues to assist in the development and completion of schedules to achieve forecast targets; developing and reviewing design concepts to ensure safe, achievable mining practices; reviewing and improving current processes to expand the mined resource; taking a leading role in risk assessment and safety management plan development; planning and co-ordinating the design and management of capital projects and mining studies; scoping and developing mining contracts and monitor the work of contractors involved in mining operations; and acting as back up to Mining manager when off site Essential criteria for these roles include tertiary qualifications in Mining Engineering accompanied with considerable exposure to underground mining in both production and planning areas. The NSW DPI Production Managers Certificate or the necessary qualifications and experience to obtain are also required for this role. To be successful in the role you will enjoy working in a team environment and demonstrate excellent written and verbal communication skills.

MINE OPERATIONS MANAGER WeOare M Dpleased 0 0 0 to 3 _advise 1 2 2that x 2we1 are 0 _seeking A M M a -Mine1 Operations Manager for Rosebery Mine in Tasmania.

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With continuous production since 1936 this underground mine has continually attracted and produced world class professionals. With a strong community focus and core values including safety and integrity, we are proud of our role in community development and our economic contribution to the local Tasmanian industry.

Residing in the Rosebery township and reporting to the General Manager, this role manages the underground operations at Rosebery, including all mining personnel, contractors, mining activity and ancillary works. You will ensure that the operations are carried out safely and in a timely manner in accordance with the mine plan. Key to success in the role is your ability to optimise the operations and develop capability and capacity in the workface to meet the future needs of Rosebery and the broader MMG Group. You will also play a key role in MMG’s support of the Monash Mining School, including graduate rotations and site visits.

To be considered, candidates must have skills, qualifications and experiences in complex mining environments that demonstrate the ability to make sound operational decisions. In addition to this, candidates must demonstrate expertise in establishing cultures and systems that imbed a safety awareness as well as managing multi-disciplinary mining teams.

Candidates with past achievements in underground mine management, base metals and change management and the ability to leverage the resources and industry of the local regions in which they operate within will be viewed favourably.

This is a rare and unique opportunity to join the site leadership of a global mining organisation with a vision 2for0 future 1 3 - growth 1 1 - and 1 2 an T 1enviable 0 : 0 record 9 : 1 of 0 +community 1 1 : 0 0 engagement, sustainability and safety.

An attractive remuneration package including an incentive scheme, accommodation and allowances will be offered.

REGIONAL ACCOUNT MANAGER – BOWEN BASIN In this autonomous, hands-on sales position you will be responsible for meeting and exceeding revenue targets and implementing key strategic account management plans to increase sales and ensure client retention. Your focus will be on relationship building through frequent site visits, attending client meetings and prompt follow up in the provision of quotes, proposals and contracts.

Also critical to your success in this position is your local knowledge of Bowen Basin and extensive background in conveyor systems.

What you need is a demonstrated success in a sales or account manager role within conveyor systems; strong business acumen and knowledge of the Bowen Basin area and mining industry; self-motivation with the drive to exceed sales targets and KPOs; strong time management and administration skills with exceptional attention to detail; superior communication, negotiation and verbal presentation skills; and the ability to build strong client and stakeholder relationships. What we offer you is the opportunity to represent one of Australia’s most well-known and iconic brands in ECS; a varied, challenging and target driven working environment; the opportunity for career advancement as our business grows; and excellent benefits including incentive bonus, company vehicle and ongoing training and development.

On offer is an exciting position, with the opportunity to work across an impressive selection of products and services whilst building on the equity of Fenner Dunlop brand. We offer recognition, progression and extensive benefits that our organisation is known for.

www.miningaustralia.com.au

AM0813_000_NAL.pdf

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A M1 2 1 3 _ 0 0 0 _ A U S 2

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EVENTS

DEVELOP NEW BUSINESS GLADSTONE, ROCKHAMPTON & CENTRAL QUEENSLAND

TOWNSVILLE, THE FAR NORTH AND png

TOOWOOMBA, SURAT BASIN & SOUTH WEST QUEENSLAND

Queensland is the boom state and there are three distinct regions that are leading the way.

Australian Events have three events that hit the heart of each of these regions in 2014, and you are invited to participate.

These are dynamic events with special Industry Forums, site visits, business networking functions and a comprehensive two day exposition in each location.

These events are short, sharp and focussed to allow businesses the best opportunities to grow industry connectivity and discover new opportunities for growth and development.

GOLD SPONSORS

CQ EXPO SPONSOR

MEDIA PARTNERS

SILVER SPONSOR

EVENT PARTNERS

CQEXPO CENTRAL QUEENSLAND

INDUSTRY & RESOURCES

19th & 20th March 2014 ROCKHAMPTON SHOWGROUNDS

www.cqexpo.com.au

27th & 28th March 2014 TOWNSVILLE ENTERTAINMENT & CONVENTION CENTRE

www.nqexpo.com.au

SURAT BASIN

ENERGY & MINING EXPO 18th & 19th June 2014 TOOWOOMBA SHOWGROUNDS

www.suratbasinexpo.com.au For exhibitor enquiries FREECALL 1800 671 588 www.australianevents.com.au 58

December 2013

AustralianMining

Conferences, seminars & workshops Event submissions can be emailed to editor@miningaustralia.com.au Central Queensland Industry & Resources Expo 19-20 March, 2014 Rockhampton, QLD CQEXPO is now in its third year and is firmly placed as a key trade event for Rockhampton and Central Queensland. This event is designed to support the industry and resource sectors of Rockhampton, Gladstone and the Southern Bowen and Galilee Basins, with exhibits by suppliers, service providers, government agencies and manufacturers. A new Chamber of Commerce in Rockhampton, exciting developments in the mining sector in Central Queensland, the promise of a new industry supportive Federal Government and an increased demand for energy through the Port of Gladstone are all helping to set the scene for a renewed boom time in Rockhampton, and across Central Queensland.

The CQEXPO will be the meeting place for those already active across the region and for those wanting to be a part of the action.

• CQ Expo www.cqexpo.com.au

WA Major Projects Conference 26 March Wheelers Hill, VIC This Conference continues to be the largest major projects and infrastructure conference in the state, attracting over 350 delegates annually. The event will feature the latest updates on infrastructure, housing and development happening in Western Australia.

With more than $280 billion worth of projects in the pipeline for Western Australia, investment in infrastructure is crucial for the state’s growth and development. This two day Conference creates a platform where senior executives from government, construction and mining will gather to network, learn and participate in discussions about the current and future projects happening in Western Australia.

• Expotrade www.waconference.com.au

North Queensland Industry & Resources Expo 27-28 March, 2014 Townsville, QLD The inaugural North Queensland Industry and Resources Expo is the third leg of the essential Industry and Resources trifecta of events in Queensland. Townsville is the economic hub and powerhouse for North Queensland, with direct air and sea links to Asia and the Pacific including PNG. It has brilliant rail and road

transport access with plans in place for future expansion of these facilities is a dedicated trade event designed to support the industry and resource sectors of North Queensland.

NQ Expo will be the showcase for this dynamic and abundant region. It will be a targeted and cost effective opportunity to network, market and generate sales, leads and industry contacts.

• NQ Expo www.nqexpo.com.au

Construction Risk Management Summit 1-2 April 2014 Wheelers Hill, VIC This timely Summit will bring together an expected 150 delegates from the construction, risk management and insurance industry.

Allowing opportunities to learn, discuss, network, challenge and collaborate under one roof. Hear how the use of technology will improve your risk management processes. All elements of risk will be discussed; contractual risk, project risk and financial risks. Covering project delivery delays, managing what happens on the construction site as well as OH&S issues.

• Expotrade www.constructionrisksummit.com.au

Mining World Moscow 9-11 April, 2014 Moscow, Russia MiningWorld Russia 2014 is the 18th international exhibition and conference for mining and processing metals and minerals in Russia. Last year more then 430 companies from 32 countries, including Australia, exhibited at the event, with the Australian ambassador speaking at the opening.

Russia is currently one of the world’s largest emerging markets, and represents a significant opportunity for Australian mining equipment and services companies to garner new work as the Australian market slows down.

According to Austrade there are a number of opportunties for Australian METS companies that include mining software and systems development;investment, including joint ventures; integrated project management; contract mining; supply (including leasing and acquisition) of mining plant and equipment; technology transfer and consultancy expertise; business process consulting; general engineering and business procedures; and a range of other services including training. A delegation to the event will be lead by Austmine.

• MiningWorld Russia www.miningworld-russia.primexpo.ru/en/ www.miningaustralia.com.au

AM1213_000_TRA

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Tough, Reliable, Hardworking…

That’s the Difference

At Texcom, we’re a close knit team. We rely on each other to get the job done on time and on budget. It doesn’t matter if we’re working on mining or civil projects, the goal is the same. That’s why we trust BKT Tyres. Just like the rest of us, they’re tough, hard working and really perform when the pressure is on. We have fitted them to our 40 tonne articulated dump trucks and wheel loader and haven’t looked back.

They deliver good wear rates, low cost per hour, low cost per millimetre and great performance in a variety of conditions. Add to that great aftersales support from the team at TFI Earthmover and you’ll start to understand why BKT has quickly become a valued member of our team.

Michael Rose, Maintenance Planner, TEXCOM

For further information on BKT contact TFI Earthmover on 1300 916 556 or visit tfiearthmover.com.au

NCATF/048

We Go The Distance

AD_AMABLMAR_13.pdf

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AEDT

Rollover compliant to Australian Design Rules with a Rollover Protection System to Australian Standards 1636.1 and 2294.2

Tilt cab for easy maintenance access

Quality Isuzu truck with excellent back up

AM

Bus module transferable onto new cabchassis when required

Australian designed and built air conditioning for rugged and remote conditions

Comfortable coach seats with seatbelts

Safe as ... tough as ... comfy as ... Aussie as … an Able Bus & Coach Safety sets these vehicles apart.

This includes, as standard, built-in Rollover Protection System (ROPS) to Australian Standards 1636.1 & 2294.2 and Australian Design Rule (ADR) rollover compliance.

Critically all engineering tests are validated and vehicles exceed the Australian Design Rule weight standards of 65kg per person by a minimum of 53 per cent.

Able vehicles are tough and engineered to deliver outstanding reliability.

The air conditioners are West Australian designed and built to withstand extreme heat and vibration experienced in Australia’s remote areas.

All vehicle framework is grit blasted and primed to protect against the effects of harsh operating conditions above or below ground.

Able fabricated modules are designed for a larger, more robust modified chassis. This makes for a stronger, more reliable vehicle over its lifetime.

Another key feature is the ability for passenger modules to be removed

from an older cab chassis and placed onto a new cab chassis, reducing the overall replacement costs.

Able not only produce quality vehicles, but provide excellent parts backup with our own 400 square meter on-site parts and components store.

Able Bus & Coach is Australian owned; we don’t import modules from overseas.

Our modules and much of

the componentry are proudly manufactured in Australia.

Able buses have been delivering outstanding performance in tough Australian conditions since 1998.

Testament to the Company’s business philosophy of building tough yet safe, reliable and comfortable vehicles that meet the highest standards are customers such as BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto.