Quarry Oct 2020

Dust control company devises an innovative alternative to rock stemming

MODULAR PLANT BOOSTS GOLD PRODUCTION Modular crushing and screening plant solution strikes gold for NSW operation

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DTH GEL MARKS PARADIGM SHIFT IN STEMMING TECH

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OFFICIAL JOURNAL OF THE INSTITUTE OF QUARRYING AUSTRALIA

OCTOBER 2020

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IN THIS ISSUE OCTOBER 2020

VOLUME 28, ISSUE 10

FEATURES 28 AIR DECKING AND THE ENVIRONMENT How air decking can be designed to reduce carbon emissions and provide other benefits in blasting.

30 ADVANCED TECH OPTIMISES BLAST DESIGN Why automatic electronic drilling patterns can have benefits upstream in the blast design process.

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DTH STEMMING GEL A dust control company has devised an innovative alternative to rock stemming.

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PLANT GOES FOR GOLD A modular crushing and screening plant has struck gold for a NSW operation.

31 STEMMING EJECTION CONTROL IN BLASTHOLES Ways to reduce the likelihood of stemming ejection from primary production blastholes.

41 OPPORTUNITIES TO IMPROVE OPERATIONS Why improved process management in the data sphere is the key to supporting operational objectives.

42 FINALISING THE KEY ACCOUNT PLAN PROCESS Mike Cameron outlines how sales and marketing personnel can ‘close the deal’ with a client.

46 CONVICTION FOR INDUSTRIAL MANSLAUGHTER

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WALKWAY SAFETY Have you given much thought to making your metal walkways as safe as possible?

OCTOBER 2020

OFFICIAL JOURNAL OF THE INSTITUTE OF QUARRYING AUSTRALIA

Modular crushing and screening plant solution strikes gold for NSW operation

38

32

22

QUARRY

Dust control company devises an innovative alternative to rock stemming

MODULAR PLANT BOOSTS GOLD PRODUCTION

A data-focused solution is monitoring attachments and tools via a user-friendly app.

A Brisbane auto-wrecking company is the first PCBU to be convicted under Queensland’s health and safety act.

OCTOBER 2020

www.quarrymagazine.com

DTH GEL MARKS PARADIGM SHIFT IN STEMMING TECH

38

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EVERY MONTH 06 FROM THE EDITOR

18 PRODUCT FOCUS

08 FROM THE PRESIDENT

48 IQA NEWS

10 NEWS THIS MONTH

49 FROM THE IQA CEO 50 GEOLOGY TALK

Quarry October 2020 3

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EDITORIAL

ARE WE THERE YET? NO, BUT THE WAY BACK IS LOOKING LESS BUMPY

A

re we there yet? It’s that impatient question you’d expect your sixyear-old to persistently ask you on a long road trip. For the child, it’s a lack of comprehension of distance and time.

The parent can only assure them that the long journey is worthwhile – there are rewards (eg the holiday, the sights) at the destination.

Perhaps it’s patronising to use this exchange through a COVID-19 lens but in recent months a lot of impatient “children” and “grumpy parents” across the political, industrial and social spectrums have bickered exactly over that question.

Though the impatience for COVID-19 to end is understandable, the lack of empathy and recriminations in some quarters have been miles off the sentiment at the start of the pandemic: “We are all in this together”.

It’s never been a more important time for Australians to unite, especially as the recovery phase will be prolonged and uncomfortable.

At time of writing, Victoria is (finally) bringing the COVID-19 outbreak to heel.

The targets the Victorian Government set for coming out of lockdown have been panned by some for being too ambitious but there are signs the strategy is working.

Maybe the Victorian economy will come out of isolation sooner than expected – but we desperately need bipartisanship, collaboration and generosity to help the state and the broader national economy back to their “feet”.

Through the pandemic, the Australian quarrying industry has admirably shown its worth as an essential service. There have been no gripes and complaints within the industry at all.

Goodness knows how many of you have been able to function like it was business as usual – nonetheless you’ve been exceptional in observing the social distancing and other safety rules, and

you’ve simply gone on with the job.

Even recently, when some COVID-19 cases were incorrectly identified in quarry workers in a Victorian regional operation, the proprietor swung into action. The quarry’s staff were isolated, the site was closed and the operation resumed as soon as the affected workers tested negative. No recriminations, no sniping – from within or without. There was the mindset to get on with the job.

Further, it’s encouraging to read from the President’s and the CEO’s columns (pages 8, 49) about IQA members’ anticipation of meeting face to face again – a testament of their collegiality and resilience.

The quarrying industry has (and I write this based on anecdotal evidence) been more fortunate than most trades in the pandemic. Even where people have lost work, there are indications that as the economy improves opportunities will arise for them and they won’t be left behind.

Further, while some elements of their businesses took a hit, industry suppliers appear to have fared better than expected. Even where new equipment purchases have fallen, the demand for spare and replacement parts and maintenance and hire services have taken up the slack.

The industry may yet be hampered by a lag in government-sanctioned infrastructure activity but for now, at least, we can approach the future with an optimistic eye.

So, no, to answer those rhetorical “children”, we’re not there yet – but the signs are heartening. We just need to be more patient and upbeat. It’s been a tough year for everyone but as an industry and a society we’re always stronger when we work together.

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THROUGH THE PANDEMIC, THE QUARRYING INDUSTRY HAS ADMIRABLY SHOWN ITS WORTH AS AN ESSENTIAL SERVICE

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Quarry October 2020

PRESIDENT’S REPORT

COLLABORATION THE KEY TO ADVANCING SCIENCE OF QUARRYING The Institute of Quarrying

A

s life moves closer to normal, IQA networking events will slowly start to recommence and some of our members may feel their interest has waned, and may not attend as they did before. This is completely understandable and we often need something to remind us why networking with other members is so important.

Catching up with friends is obviously the starting point when contemplating attendance. I know I will be looking forward to catching up with my friends, as opposed to seeing them on a computer screen. When I think more about it, while it is vital we reconnect with people in person once again, there is another important reason to attend IQA networking events – that is, collaboration. This is how we have interacted in the past and must continue to do so in the future to advance the science of quarrying.

Our industry is vital to help Australia deliver the extensive building and construction program it requires as we commence Australia’s economic recovery. We need to be ready for the increase in demand and effectively manage important factors such as health, safety, environment, and sustainability. If we hope to find better ways to advance the science of quarrying and effectively manage all these very important factors we need to collaborate.

As the old African proverb states: “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” Through collaboration and working together, we will go far as we find the solutions to meet and overcome these challenges and take advantage of the opportunities.

Collaboration is important because we can share knowledge and experience.

This is what we have been doing with our New Zealand friends through IQNZ president Dean Torstonson.

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Quarry October 2020

Australia

Kylie Fahey, Dean and I have over a number of months been exploring opportunities to reduce or eliminate duplication in our educational offering.

We are working on new educational and developmental programs that are common across both countries and which we consider our members would benefit from, like mental health and mentoring programs for our younger members, just to name a few. There is a strong commitment to finding better ways to help and support our members.

This is what the Institute of Quarrying fellowship is all about; it doesn’t matter where the ideas or solutions come from so long as we take advantage of our collective knowledge and experience which can be found everywhere through our respective memberships and other Institutes of Quarrying throughout the world. This is true collaboration and reminded me again what it really means to be an IQ member and belong to an Institute that is committed to advancing the science of quarrying.

The IQA AGM which is normally held at either the CMIC or IQA conference will be held this year virtually in November to allow sufficient time to move past Victoria’s setbacks. This will provide an opportunity for many more members to attend the AGM and to hear in more detail about the Board’s strategy and progress. Communication on how you can attend will be sent to all members in the coming weeks. I hope to see you there!

On behalf of the IQA board and administration, we wish you, your family, and friends all the very best of health and happiness.

SHANE BRADDY President Institute of Quarrying Australia

Educating and connecting our extractive industry

quarry.com.au IF YOU WANT TO GO FAST, GO ALONE. IF YOU WANT TO GO FAR, GO TOGETHER

The Institute of Quarrying Australia’s goals are: 1. To provide world class professional development for the extractive industries.

2. To establish an Australasian Academy of Quarrying.

3. To align service offerings with industry needs.

IQA CONTACTS: Chief Executive Officer Kylie Fahey PO Box 1779 Milton BC QLD 4064 Phone: 0477 444 328 ceo@quarry.com.au Company Secretary Rod Lester Phone: 0408 121 788 rgl@rlester.com.au Finance Officer Gemma Thursfield Phone: 0402 431 090 gemma@quarry.com.au Web Maintenance, Graphic Design, ePrograms, IT Support Ryan Spence Phone: 0422 351 831 ryan.spence@quarry.com.au General, membership and financial inquiries should be directed to admin@quarry.com.au or phone 02 9484 0577.

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NEWS

BORAL SETS SIGHTS ON FY21 PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT ‘BUSHFIRES AND FLOODS, FOLLOWED

BY COVID-19 DISRUPTIONS, RESULTED IN LOWER VOLUMES, HIGHER COSTS AND REDUCED EARNING FOR ALL DIVISIONS’ ZLATKO TODORCEVSKI BORAL CEO Boral’s brains trust has expressed disappointment with the company’s performance.

Boral is optimistic that renewed construction activity around Australia will raise its fortunes in 2021 after its global operations took a big hit in the 2019-20 financial year.

Boral’s global operations for FY2019-20 incurred $1.35 billion in impairment charges, including $1.22 billion to its North American operations, and $123 million to its Boral Australia operations.

Boral’s impairment charges are from assets within Boral North America including goodwill, intangible assets and Boral’s investment in the Meridian Brick joint venture.

The company’s North American assessment found that demand uncertainty from COVID-19, along with affected economic and operating conditions, and Boral’s operating

performance have all attributed to the $1.22bn in impairment charges.

Boral Australia’s assessment is based on the decline in housing construction, a slowing of infrastructure construction, reduced construction activity in Western Australia and the Northern Territory, the impacts of the bushfires on its timber business and further COVID-19 uncertainty.

Boral’s financial results for the year ended 30 June, 2020 revealed the company’s future challenges.

Its earnings before interest, tax depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) was at $710 million (down 30 per cent) while its net profit after tax was at $181 million (down 57 per cent on the corresponding period).

Boral enlisted Zlatko Todorcevski

as the company’s new chief executive officer, who started his role on 1 July, 2020. Todorcevski said economic and market uncertainty has dampened the company’s performance.

“Boral’s FY2020 results reflect a particularly challenging year. Following the lower than expected first half result from Boral North America, Boral had a difficult start to the second half of FY2020,” he said.

“Boral Australia was impacted by bushfire- and flood-related events, resulting in significantly lower volumes and higher costs. This was quickly followed by COVID-19 disruptions, resulting in higher costs and production curtailments, which substantially reduced earnings for all divisions.”

Boral chairperson Kathryn Fagg said the company’s performance and impairments were disappointing.

“We have taken a substantial impairment which acknowledges the recent under-performance of Boral’s businesses, recognises the current market uncertainty and adopts lower forward volumes than prior expectations,” she said.

“We are disappointed with Boral’s performance and the need to take such a large impairment. However, we are focused on making the right decisions for the company and for shareholders.”

Boral is currently undertaking a board renewal by recruiting two new directors based in Australia. •

ERR MAKES TEMPORARY CHANGES TO VICTORIAN QUARRIES Earth Resources Regulation has made changes to the compliance activities of quarries and mines across Victoria as part of the state’s COVID-19 restrictions.

via workplan.approvals@ecodev.vic.gov. au to discuss the options of virtual initial site meetings, including the use of video footage and photographs.

“We are limiting our on-site activity to responses to critical incidents or where there is a significant risk to public safety, the environment, land or infrastructure.

Metropolitan Melbourne has been under Stage 4 restrictions, while regional Victoria experienced Stage 3 restrictions.

Office-based rehabilitation bonds have also been temporarily stopped and will be unable to accept bank guarantees.

“We will continue to attend meetings, investigate complaints and follow up on non-compliance in line with the directions of the Chief Health Officer.”

The temporary changes include a suspension to on-site initial site meetings for proposed work plans and variations while the current restrictions are in place.

Earth Resources encourages quarries to contact its assessments team

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Quarry October 2020

“We have made some temporary changes to our compliance procedures to ensure we safely carry out activities while coronavirus (COVID-19) restrictions are in place across Victoria,” Earth Resources Regulation’s acting executive director Paul McDonald told Quarry.

Earth Resources also said it would fast track Work Plan variations to support the supply of resources for major infrastructure and bushfire recovery projects, along with industry approvals to address the impacts of COVID-19. •

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NEWS

QUEENSLAND GOVERNMENT STARTS MANDATORY LUNG HEALTH CHECKS, SILICA DUST LIMITS Lung health checks and harsher dust limits for quarries have taken effect in Queensland to prevent industry-specific diseases such as respirable crystalline silica (RCS).

The free mandatory lung health checks will now be extended from the state’s coal mine workers to its other 15,000 metalliferous mine and quarry workers.

The Queensland Government has also enacted revised levels for coal and silica dust which can lead to black lung disease, RCS and silicosis.

The allowable limit for silica dust has been cut to 0.05 milligrams per cubic metre (mg/m3) from 1mg/m3, and 1.5mg/m3 of respirable coal dust from 2.5mg/m3.

Queensland Mines Minister Dr Anthony Lynham said these were part of a suite of reforms to protect the state’s resources workforce.

“Every Queensland worker has the right to a healthy career and life free of occupational disease,” he said.

“Queensland now has the toughest mine safety and health laws in the world – including the offence of industrial manslaughter.”

Each of Queensland’s metalliferous mine and quarry workers will be given a chest X-ray that is read by at least two qualified radiologists under the free mandatory lung health checks.

These will be conducted at least once every five years from when a resources worker begins their career in the industry to when they retire. •

An X-ray of uncomplicated silicosis in the lungs.

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Quarry October 2020

BADGERYS CREEK QUARRY TO REOPEN BY END OF 2020 CSR’S APPLICATION WAS FASTTRACKED BY THE PLANNING SYSTEM ACCELERATION PROGRAM

Following almost a decade of closure, CSR’s Badgerys Creek Quarry will return to quarrying and rehabilitation in Sydney’s west.

The New South Wales Government has approved CSR’s application for a modification of the quarry, after it was fast-tracked in late July as part of the state government’s Planning System Acceleration Program.

NSW Department of Planning, Industry and Environment’s executive director of energy and resource assessments Mike Young said the approved application will allow quarrying and rehabilitation work to begin for the next 11 years, providing up to 100 new jobs.

“This approval includes rehabilitating 110 hectares of previously quarried land next to the new Western Sydney Airport, creating the opportunity for future industrial facilities and job opportunities close to where people live in Sydney’s west,” Young said.

“Water collected in the quarry pits over the past decade will also

Badgerys Creek Quarry will reopen after nearly a decade of closure. Image courtesy of CSR.

be used to improve air quality by suppressing dust during construction of the Western Sydney Airport, reducing demand on Sydney’s potable water supply.”

The NSW Government’s Planning System Acceleration Program has supplied almost 43,000 new jobs and provided $18.9 billion to the state’s economy. CSR’s separate application to expand and upgrade its Badgerys Creek brickmaking facility was also approved by the Department. This will supply another $150 million in capital investment and up to 70 jobs in Sydney’s west. •

TOOWOOMBA COUNCIL BACKS QUARRY ADVISORY COMMITTEE Toowoomba mayor Paul Antonio has defended the character of the Bridge Street Quarry Development Advisory Committee set up to review the postlife use of a century-old quarry.

The Bridge Street Quarry Development Advisory Committee has been set up to supply leadership, advice and recommendations on the principles and strategic direction, investment and market opportunities of the dormant Bridge Street Quarry, which was used for more than 100 years and is today owned by the Toowoomba Regional Council.

Development plans have been ongoing since 1995 to rehabilitate the site into a parks and gardens tourist attraction.

The committee’s membership consists of 15 members and three additional external advisors to develop the site in line with the Bridge Street Quarry Redevelopment Feasibility Study 2018, published by KPMG.

The Bridge Street Quarry Development Advisory Committee has aimed to develop the site into a tourist attraction.

Eight of the committee members are councillors.

“The chair of the advisory committee, Councillor Kerry Shine, is passionate about the Quarry Gardens and is also a very balanced advocate,” Antonio told the ABC. “There are many external groups on that committee but the ultimate decision, the recommendation of the advisory committee, will come to council for endorsement or otherwise.” •

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NEWS

AUSTRALIAN PCI FALLS AMID VICTORIAN COVID-19 RESTRICTIONS After a minor rally in the middle of the year, the Australian construction industry felt the effects of the Victorian COVID-19 lockdown in the September AiG/HIA joint survey.

The Australian Performance Construction Index (PCI) had its improving July figures cut short after dropping 4.8 points to 37.9 in August.

Victoria’s Stage 4 restrictions and other border closures around the nation have adversely affected builders and reduced confidence, with construction activity down 14.5 points to 31.1 points. There were also declines in the new orders index - to 35.1, down 8.4 points.

According to Australian Industry Group head of policy Peter Burn, the “sharp fall in activity in Victoria was a major factor in the downturn while border restrictions in other states have hampered builders and constructors who are reliant on interstate supplies and availability of tradies from across borders.

“The further decline in orders in August will be a major concern, both for their businesses and for their employees and suppliers.”

Activity and new orders across all four construction sectors also fell, including apartment building activity (down 11.1 points to 22.8), engineering construction activity (down 18.5 points to 27.0), commercial activity (down 9.6 points to 32.4) and housing activity (down 9.6 points to 37.4).

The average wages index rose 6.1 points to 53.5, while the employment index was up 4.7 points to 46.1 points. •

Apartment building in the last AiG/HIA PCI survey was down by 11.1 points.

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Quarry October 2020

ADBRI REINFORCES FINANCIAL POSITION WITH $29M PROFIT ADBRI CEO NICK MILLER SAID THE COMPANY HAS BEEN LARGELY UNFAZED BY COVID-19

Adbri has earned a net profit after tax of $29.1 million for the first half of 2020, despite the economic strain of COVID-19, but has refrained from supplying a full year earnings guidance due to the uncertainties about the pandemic.

Adbri listed several key strategic initiatives including lime volume and earnings recovery, reduced costs and operational improvement, targeted downstream integration and diversification, increased infrastructure exposure, and increasing value opportunities in its land holdings.

Adbri has stood strong in the face of COVID-19, achieving $29 million in profits.

operations have outperformed the prior period,” he said.

The company statement attributed federal and state government stimulus packages to deflecting much of the impacts COVID-19 may have inflicted on Adbri, “particularly the fast-tracking of construction projects including infrastructure spending, home building grants and stamp duty relief”.

The company’s cement sales dropped by six per cent compared to the first half of 2019, due to the impact of bushfires, floods and market softening in New South Wales.

However, mining projects saw Adbri’s cement volumes rise by seven per cent in Western Australia.

Adbri chief executive officer Nick Miller said the company has been largely unfazed by COVID-19, as Australia’s resources sector continues its operations.

Concrete volumes dropped by 13 per cent, again due to the swathe of natural disasters in NSW and Queensland and market softness.

Victorian demand defied the odds and enjoyed an increase in activity across the commercial, multi-residential and industrial precast markets. •

“Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, our volumes have maintained a solid trajectory and some parts of our

CRUSHING SPARES SUPPLIER JOINS AMSTED GLOBAL SOLUTIONS Local mining and quarrying parts and equipment supplier Crushing Equipment has become part of the US OEM Amsted Global Solutions (AGS), a global provider of castings, springs and components for industrial applications.

replace Crushing Equipment’s part of the market.

Crushing Equipment, which was first set up in Melbourne in 1965, was in 2019 sold to South African company Cast Products, which decided to close the company.

AGS is part of Amsted Industries, a global manufacturer of industrial components across mining, construction, rail, trucking, automotive and other industrial applications.

The good news is members of the Crushing Equipment team, including managing director Tom Bruce, will now work for AGS, which has recently expanded to the Australian mining wear parts market.

AGS vice president Kevin Skibinski said a presence in Australia “allows us to better serve our customers around the world, strengthening our global network that includes facilities on six continents, including manufacturing locations in the US, South Africa, Brazil and China”. •

In a letter to the old company’s customers, Bruce said AGS will

“AGS will be available and ready to fill the void in the market from today and comes to you highly recommended by the Crushing Equipment team,” Bruce said.

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NEWS

EASTER ISLAND STATUES JUST THE ‘TIP OF THE ICEBERG’ Archaeologists from the University of California (UCLA) have discovered the Easter Island heads have intact bodies hidden beneath the surface of the island.

The Easter Island statues – better known as “Moai” to the Rapa Nui people that crafted the artefacts in the tropical South Pacific – were first discovered on the island between 1100 and 1500CE, with nearly half of them based at the Rano Raraku volcanic cone, the ancient quarry that supplied the volcanic tuff rocks that were used to carve the figures.

It remains a mystery how hundreds of the Moai statues were transported to stone platforms that are scattered around the island.

After being given approval, the UCLA archaeologists excavated two of the Island heads to reveal their hidden bodies.

The torso and truncated waists of the Easter Island heads had been covered by successive mass transport deposits of sediment, gradually burying them over time.

According to the archaeologists, etchings of canoes found on the backs of some statues represent the carver’s family, upending more clues about the island’s different family or group structures.

The statues were carved and erected with large tree trunks, placed in holes next to the statues, with a rope then being used to lift the statues upright.

The UCLA team studied about 1000 statues on Easter Island throughout the nine-year project. •

RECYCLED GLASS SAND PASSES TEST IN THE ACT THE LOW COST AND LOWER RCS CONTENT OF RECYCLED GLASS SAND APPEALS TO BUILDING PROJECTS

ACT water and wastewater company Icon Water has partnered with ACT NoWaste and Regroup to create sand from recycled glass. The three companies plan to develop and trial the glass sand as a building material in sewer pipes.

By reprocessing kerbside glass in Canberra, the Hume Materials Recovery Facility – aka Regroup – has previously manufactured recovered glass sand products, sparing glass waste from going to landfill.

Icon Water has been trialling recycled glass sand in its sewer pipes instead of extracted river sand.

The trial has been labelled a success after being approved by the ACT’s Environmental Protection Agency and Icon Water.

Recycled glass sand appeals to building projects due to its lower cost and lower respirable crystalline silica content.

“As the supplier of Canberra’s water and sewerage services for over 100

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Quarry October 2020

years, we understand the value that Canberrans place on the environment and sustainability,” Icon Water’s managing director Ray Hezkial said.

“In providing an essential service to the community, our priority is not only to deliver a safe and reliable service but to implement sustainable practices throughout the work we do.”

Around 200 tonnes of pipe embedment sand is used each year

by Icon Water through its sewer mains maintenance program.

The sustainable sand alternative will also be available for developers and contractors. •

MOOTED QUARRY STUCK BETWEEN A PLANT AND A HARD PLACE A rare species plant may thwart Australian mining company Ioneer from developing a quarry in the Rhyolite Ridge valley in Nevada, USA. The proposed quarry will extract lithium for potentially 400,000 electric car batteries per year and boron for magnets in wind turbines.

However, the area of the proposed quarry houses a rare plant species – Tiehm’s buckwheat (Eriogonum tiehmii) – that grows in the same soil as the lithium and boron minerals.

University of Nevada’s Arnold Tiehm, who is the plant’s namesake, said only 40,000 specimens of the buckwheat exist – mostly in the area of the proposed quarry. Tiehm first discovered it in 1983.

xxx Several Easter Island statues have bodies underground.

Sand is being manufactured from the reprocessing of kerbside glass in Canberra.

Ioneer has already caused an outcry from researchers by confirming that 65 per cent of the plant’s population, which has stayed relatively the same since 1983, will be removed if the quarry proceeds.

The Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) is petitioning to preserve the species.

“The extinction threat to Tiehm’s buckwheat is clear,” CBD Nevada state director Patrick Donnelly said.

“The proposed project identifies that more than 60 per cent of the living plants of the species would be extirpated in the first phase, and the footprint encompasses the entire global range of the species.

“In fact, the proposed impact to Tiehm’s buckwheat is so egregious that no mitigation measures are acceptable or could lessen the impact to the species.”

Although they do not oppose lithium mining, the scientists in the petition argue they cannot abide the benefits of clean energy outweighing biodiversity protection.

Ioneer has funded researchers at the University of Nevada, Reno, to pursue relocation options for the rare plant. •

PRODUCT FOCUS

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K-COMMANDER SERIES ENHANCES BELT TRACKING PERFORMANCE The K-Commander Series offers solutions for belt tracking, eliminating the issue of misaligned conveyor belts. There are several products in the K-Commander series: the K-Commander Exceed, with alldirection belt tracking and flexible 360-degree rotational capability; the K-Commander Control, installed on the return side of the conveyor to maintain belt alignment; the K-Commander Direct, with a pivoting base style to automatically provide belt centring in trough and return applications; the K-Commander tracking discs, which are used in pairs prior to a conveyor’s tail pulley to eliminate spillage; and the K-Commander Guide Series INV, an all-purpose conveyor belt alignment idler for short-centred or reversing conveyor applications.

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TRACKED PUGMILL OFFERS UNIQUE MATERIAL BLENDING DESIGN The IMS PM 1050-16TB tracked pugmill features a pugmill head with twin mixer shafts to enable anti-surging and high production output for material blending. It is equipped with a variable speed conveyor, water surge tank and control gauges to ensure a consistent flow to the mixing chamber. The pugmill head is also removable and the unit can be adapted as a tracked conveyor.

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Quarry October 2020

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PRODUCT FOCUS

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L-SERIES AGGREGATE HANDLER LOADER The 884L aggregate handler loader is built to be productive and easy to operate. It is fitted with a new cab, joystick steering, intuitive controls, and numerous features to reduce operator burnout. The 844L also features up to a nine per cent increase in engine power and seven per cent less fuel burn than its K-Series predecessors, with an improved torque converter and better rimpull capabilities in the pile. All-new adjustable electrohydraulic controls enable the operator to tune and configure controls to his/her preferences.

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20

Quarry October 2020

DRILL & BLAST

Stem Gel is a ‘super absorbent polymer’ that, when pumped into a blasthole or used in above ground stemming, will stabilise water as a containment system for explosives.

DOWN THE HOLE GEL MARKS

PARADIGM SHIFT IN STEMMING TECH It’s been a work in progress for four years but a longstanding dust control company has devised an innovative alternative to conventional rock stemming in blasting.

Mason Trouchet, of Rainstorm Dust Control, spoke to Damian Christie about the company’s new stem gel product.

22

Quarry October 2020

R

ainstorm Dust Control has operated for more than three decades across Australia, providing solutions in dust control, materials handling, rehabilitation and erosion control, coatings and contracting for the mining, civil construction, and quarrying sectors.

Rainstorm’s dust control solutions have traditionally addressed haul roads and stockpiles and open areas but have now expanded to encompass the dual challenges of dust and noise generated by blasting. In late August 2018, the Perthheadquartered company announced – in partnership with PWS Shockwave Gel Systems – that it would begin trialling and eventually distributing Stem Gel – a new patented technology as an alternative to the conventional rock stemming method. The product was first developed in 2015 by an inventor and licensed to PWS but it wasn’t until Rainstorm Dust Control engaged with PWS that the first steps were initiated to bring Stem Gel to the market.

“Rainstorm became involved because over

the 30 years that we’ve been in business doing roads and open areas, we’ve always been challenged about what we do with dust that comes from a blast,” Rainstorm’s Mason Trouchet explained. “Blasting was a bit of an outlier in terms of dust control because it was a high impact dust event in a relatively short period of time in a relatively small area. It didn’t necessarily have a big impact on the overall dust of a site like a truck driving up and down a road all day long does.

“So we looked at this technology, and what we found with the blasting and the gel was two things: one, that some of the test work we did showed a greater than 50 per cent reduction in noise, and two, a lot of the quarries operate close to local communities and public areas, so we could comfortably bring about a reduction in dust in all the blasting.”

He added that a lot of the dust that flies out of the hole in a blast is generated by the rock aggregate that is put down the hole. “If you don’t have that stemming aggregate,

you’re reducing that kind of rock by blowing it up in little dusty bits.”

STEM GEL Trouchet explained Stem Gel is a “super absorbent polymer” that, once pumped into a blasthole or used in above ground stemming, will stabilise water as a solid containment system for the explosive. When the blast is initiated, Stem Gel attenuates 98 per cent of the energy of the pressure wave (Pw) and diverts it into surrounding rock to increase fragmentation during the initial moments of the explosion (see Figure 1).

“When you blow things up, the pressure wave actually moves three to five milliseconds (m/s) in front of the plasma gases,” Trouchet said. “And what we’ve validated is that the pressure wave hits the gel and attenuates in front of that energy, and then a millisecond later, the plasma gases hit the gel and vaporise the first section of the stem.

“The principle of the energy as it comes up the hole and hits the top of the bench is like a balloon bursting and the energy is immediately dispersed in all directions,” he added. “If you can bring that energy higher than the hole – which is what we call stemming above the hole – you actually don’t disperse that balloon, it won’t burst until it hits the stemming material above the hole, which in turn brings the energy right to the surface of the bench.

“The problem with stemming is that if it’s not effective when the blast energy comes up, you get oversize material in that space above the explosive. But because we can [with Stem Gel] use far less stemming horizon or depth, you can bring the explosive higher up the hole and get away with a small amount of stemming in the hole, like a little mushroom, and with a little bit of stemming above the hole, you’re able to get the energy higher up the bench and therefore have less oversize.

“The subsequent benefit of that powerful containment,” he added, “is a sizeable reduction in noise and dust. As the gel is expressed from the blast and becomes airborne, dust particles flocculate in mid-air and fall to the ground. The gel itself acts like an aerial flocculant, and you can see it on the actual muckpile afterwards, the little grains of aggregated particles that have fallen to the ground, as opposed to flying off into neighbouring areas.”

Figure 1. Using a stem gel, the PWS product technology can reflect or attenuate 98 per cent of the pressure wave generated by an explosive detonation.

In addition to greater fragmentation and less oversize, Stem Gel, combined with optimal blasthole design and drill patterns, leads to lower powder factors, smaller holes, increased safety (with reduced oversize risk areas) and significant cost savings, particularly for mines and quarries.

“The big factor for quarries is that it will give them better fragmentation at the higher part of the bench,” Trouchet said. “Stem Gel has enough ramifications for the crushing plants and a ripple effect for the throughput of the plant. So that’s where the actual crossbenefits will come for the quarries and the miners, they will be able to dig faster and crush faster.”

pulse in the gel stemming due to the detonation-induced shock wave (indicating an attenuation of the Pw by the gel).

• There was somewhat less fine material at the hole collar than the aggregate stemming.

• There was no discernible difference in the performance of weighted and unweighted gel.

• There was an ability to remediate a misfired hole through removal of the stem gel.

• It was possible for the gel to solidify water at the bottom of the blasthole and then load ANFO on the gel.

PRODUCT VALIDATIONS Since late 2018, Rainstorm Dust Control has partnered with numerous companies in the mining and quarrying segments to test and perfect the Stem Gel and substantiate the cost savings and benefits it offers. Indeed, major conclusions from a trial of Stem Gel in a Western Australian limestone quarry with 102mm holes was that: • Its performance was comparable to that of aggregate stemming.

• No poor detonation was measured at the interface of the gel and ammonium nitrate/fuel oil (ANFO), indicating there was no degradation of the ANFO. • There was no measurable pressure

Rainstorm also partnered with Holcim Australia’s quarry division in WA in trialling the product. Trouchet said he was bound by confidentiality with regards to the finer details of the Holcim trial but that the quarrying business was nonetheless “happy with the results, particularly as the trial validated the reduction in noise and dust, which was the primary purpose. The fragmentation was also very successful”.

He added there have been successful trials in the mining sector, with global iron ore miner First Quantum Minerals and gold miner Newcrest Gold. The latter installed sensors in the hole to measure the pressure wave of the blasts and to validate the attenuation.

Quarry October 2020 23

DRILL & BLAST

As the gel itself behaves like an aerial flocculant, the granules of the aggregated particles can be seen on the muckpile afterwards.

The 250mm long blast mat panels come in a 40mm wide box.

Most importantly, some of the global explosives suppliers – Orica, MAXAM and Dyno Nobel – have also been running what Trouchet described as “sleep tests” with the Stem Gel, using combinations of both ANFO and emulsion explosives across different sites.

“Dyno Nobel and Orica are testing the stemming gel not just against specific products for a trial but every single product or explosive type in their inventory. It means that for any client who says ‘I’m using a Dyno 24

Quarry October 2020

product’ or ‘I’m using an Orica product’, we already have the sleep test, so they can go straight to trial. It removes this delay to market that each individual company needs to worry about before they do a trial.

“It’s also particularly important for medium to smaller quarries that are working with lesser known explosives groups because they use more local suppliers than the major companies. It means there’s a fast track to doing the trials without having to do the sleep tests.”

DELIVERY METHODS While the principles of the Stem Gel have been validated across many trials by quarries, mines and the explosives groups, the next problem that the product presented for Rainstorm was the method of delivery. Rainstorm ultimately settled on several means, depending on the sector it is servicing: • LR2, the liquid reagent that is pumped into the holes, loading the stem gel on top of the explosive.

• A down the hole dewatering agent (DHDA).

• Dosing rigs for above ground and underground stemming.

• Blast mats for surface stemming, fly rock containment and dust control.

Trouchet said that for the quarrying industry, some of the methods for delivering the Stem Gel are either quite complex or very expensive.

“The DHDA is a powder – or ‘free particle’ flour-size polymers – that coats little granules of rock that are literally tipped down the hole,” he explained, “and because it’s attached to these granules of rock – which aren’t much bigger than three or four one hundreds and thousands altogether – the polymer is pulled through the column of water to the bottom and it instantly solidifies the down hole water into a solid gel and a stemming gel. And what happens is that one litre of water is the equivalent of 1.7 litres of plasma gas energy – it’s like making more explosive out of the stemming gel.

“The LR2 is a liquid reagent that is pumped into holes that are then loaded with stem gel on top of the explosive,” he continued. “We use this for the big mines that are filling the big holes and require trucks and dosing rigs.”

Neither the DHDA nor the liquid reagent are particularly expensive – but the costs rise when it comes to the additional resources required to implement them.

Trouchet said that dosing rigs are the most ideal way of dispensing the LR2 and the DHDA. “The breakthrough of this technology is that you can actually perform what is called a ‘one-pass lead-in’, so you could load the hole with the explosives and then the same truck could effectively load the stemming gel.

The Stem Gel is able to be pumped vertically in a blasthole to six metres, and in this capacity opens up stemming for underground and contour work.”

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Motorbase - Screens, Feeders Rainstorm’s blast mat panels are thought to be the best, most cost-effective method of delivering Stem Gel to a quarry’s blast site.

COST-EFFECTIVE BLAST MAT PANELS For now, the best, most cost-effective method of delivering Stem Gel to a quarry’s blast site is through rolls of 250mm by 400mm blast mat panels cut to fit the hole. While rubber and recycled tyre mats or steel plates have been used over the years to suppress dust and noise emissions on blast sites, Trouchet said Rainstorm’s blast mat panels actually contribute to the stemming gel process.

The mats, he said, work on the same principles as the DHDA. “We’ve taken the same powder and then put it inside the mat panels which is a tissue paper-style cloth that is permeable with water. So all a quarry professional has to do is wet those panels, the panels swell up over the hole within 30 seconds and you have your stem.

“Water as the stemming material is the novelty,” he continued.

“Two things come out of that: one, it’s a lot cheaper just because you have that tissue paper and the polymer in there isn’t that expensive, and two, you add the water, and so water does the work. With traditional rubber blasting mats, the intention is to remove those mats and reuse them over and over again in other blasts. In this case, our blast mat panels are a one-off – you load one up, put it over the hole and that’s the end of it.”

Trouchet said the blast mat panels are a new innovation and have only just come off the production line. “We were initially a little nervous about putting the mats out without having the dosing equipment close behind to do the job properly down the hole. We didn’t want the efficacy of the mats to be the be all and end all when the main focus is on stemming down the hole. However, now that we have that groundwork sorted, we are happy to introduce the blast mats to the market. So people will go out and play with the mats. It’s an opportunity for them to experiment without any major costs, and after they realise it can give them better

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DRILL & BLAST

The blast mats contain a tissue paper that is permeable with water and once each panel is wettened, it will swell up within 30 seconds over the hole, providing the stemming required.

fragmentation, we can then talk about other, more advanced alternatives for stemming the hole and saving even more costs.”

He added that in adapting the blast mats to their blasting procedures, quarry operators should not have to really change their preparations at all.

“With the mats, we’re not necessarily saying to them, ‘Oh, change what you’re doing!’ We can say to them: ‘Continue with your rock aggregate, do everything that you’re doing every day of the week.

However, on top of the holes, build up 200mm of the mats, and then you will have your above ground stemming.’ In other words, you will have explosive, aggregate, rock and then stemming mats on the surface.

“The purpose of this exercise is to come to the quarry market primarily to reduce noise and dust, and to illustrate how easy that can be if the blast mats are laid over the top of the hole just by adding water to those blankets.

“All of a sudden, with nothing more than adding water and laying them out, quarries will get a reduction in noise and dust, which has been a real challenge to that market.

“We’re selling those panels – their configuration is 250mm long and they come in a 40mm wide box – and they can be cut to whatever size and length is desired. The advantage for the quarries is that it’s a low entry cost process to validate or to start experimenting with the stemming gel.”

Trouchet added that, by comparison, it may cost quarries between $5000 and $6000 to hire a dosing rig.

26

Quarry October 2020

“In our marketing strategy,” he added, “introducing the mats now is a low risk to the quarries that experiment with this material and will lead to more sophisticated applications.

“In the quarries, if they hit an oversize rock, they will drill a hole in that rock, and throw some gel down that, and you could lay these mats over that rock and it would contain that energy in there.

“All of this leads to less explosive use, efficiencies in the drill size diameter of the hole, and the density of the explosives.

There’s a number of facets that we are looking at, and we have software that is backing this up.”

TO MARKET Trouchet said that Rainstorm Dust Control, after four years of experimentation, sleep tests, trials and in-field tests, is ready to take Stem Gel to the next stage of commercial development.

“In the development phase, it took some time for the product’s capacity to be a stemming material to be understood and validated,” he said.

“The second part of the equation was how to put it in the hole – how do you actually apply it? Part of the delay in the industry wasn’t so much on the efficacy of the chemistry of the material, that was pretty quickly understood by all the drill and blast professionals. It was about the activity on the bench, to get it down the hole. That was complicated because there was no

equipment until we invented and built it and came up with the blast mats to actually get it into the market – where the quarrying and mining people would go: ‘That’s a tool we can use because it’s easy to use’.

“The real interesting part of this is that blasting in all aspects is going through a huge technical revelation at the moment,” Trouchet continued.

“Explosives companies are doing magical things with their timers and detonators, they’re making amazing changes to the density of their explosives as they drop them down the hole.

“The big missing piece in all of this has been how to stem – and there were very few alternatives on the market that were effective. It’s that unique characteristic of Stem Gel to measurably reduce noise and dust output from blasting that makes it such a game-changer.

“So there’s been a paradigm shift in the stemming technology,” Trouchet concluded.

“We’re going to launch it, take it to business and I reckon within a year or two we’ll be partnering with one of those explosives groups because it’s up their alley for them to take us global.

“We’ve been focusing on the Australian market first, which is logical to get to where we are based and where the core businesses are. Eventually Stem Gel will be a global thing but for now we’re quite happy to be in Australia as we launch it.”

For more information about Stem Gel, visit rainstorm.com.au/dust-control/blasting •

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DRILL & BLAST

A 35,000-tonne air-decked blast.

AIR DECKING

AND THE ENVIRONMENT Air decking in blasting enables explosive energy to act repeatedly in separate pulses on the surrounding rock mass, rather than instantly, as in concentrated charge blasting. Varidrill director Steve Gilmartin reveals how air decking can reduce carbon emissions and provide other benefits in blasting.

T

he issue of climate change and reducing our carbon footprint is high on everyone’s environmental agenda.

This article explains how the carbon dioxide (CO2) produced in a quarry blast can be calculated and offers some ideas on how it can be reduced. For simplicity, ammonium nitrate/fuel oil (ANFO) has been used as the main explosive. Bulk and cartridge explosives will give slightly different results, but as ammonium nitrate forms a large percentage of most commercial explosives, the following will provide a reasonable base to work from.

Explosives work by producing large quantities of gases. ANFO mixed in the standard proportion of 94 per cent ammonium nitrate (AN) to six per cent fuel oil (FO) will produce water in the form of steam, nitrogen and CO2. The quantity of CO2 produced can be calculated by adding up the molecular weights of the chemical reaction between the FO and the AN. Thus, every tonne of ANFO used produces 176kg of CO2.

As a practical example, a quarry producing one million tonnes of rock per year, using ANFO with a blast ratio (BR) of seven tonnes per kilogram, would require 143 tonnes of ANFO, producing around 25 tonnes of CO2.

However, if the BR was at the lower end, eg four tonnes per kilogram, that would require 250 tonnes of ANFO, producing some 44 tonnes of CO2, a 76 per cent increase in emissions. Thus, the BR can have a significant impact on the carbon footprint as well as fragmentation.

28

Quarry October 2020

Any well run quarry should already be maximising its BR to ensure optimum fragmentation, good floor conditions, face stability and to reduce its carbon footprint.

But has air decking been considered?

When explosives are detonated in a blasthole they produce a single high amplitude stress wave which crushes the blasthole and moves further into the surrounding rock, producing a crack mechanism. During or after the stress wave propagation, high temperature/pressure gases assist and extend the crack formation and produce the expansion and movement of the rock mass. The blasthole pressure produced by commercial explosive is far in excess of that required to fracture the rock, so if explosive weight can be reduced without compromising fragmentation, floor conditions or final wall stability, this would offer advantages to the quarry operator. By incorporating an air column (air deck) above or within the explosive column, secondary or multiple stress waves are produced which extend the duration of their action, thus increasing the extent of crack propagation.

The reduced blasthole pressure caused by the air deck is still capable of creating an extended fracture system plus sufficient high pressure gas to obtain the desired amount of ground movement. The lower peak blasthole pressure reduces the loss of explosive energy associated with excessive crushing of the rock adjacent to the blasthole.

Air decks can be created at any point

down the length of the blasthole simply and effectively by using gasbags. Gasbags are high strength balloons capable of “locking off” a blasthole and bearing heavy explosive loads for a long period of time. They consist of an outer polypropylene bag, and an inner “balloon” containing an aerosol. They are activated by pressing a button on the aerosol (easily accessible through the wall of the balloon) and lowered to the desired depth in the borehole using a tape or string hooked onto a plastic loop on the bag. A built-in delay allows sufficient time to get it into position. A sharp tug on the string breaks the loop so the hook can be retrieved.

As an environmental aid, a simple air deck between the top of the explosive column and the stemming is easily achieved by stopping explosive delivery into the hole, for example two metres below the normal column length.

The hole is sealed with a gasbag at normal stemming height then stemmed off on top of the gasbag. In the case of ANFO in a 115mm hole, this will reduce the explosive by about 16kg per hole or about 18 per cent in a 15m hole with a corresponding reduction in CO2 emissions.

Another topical consideration in these days of changing weather patterns is the considerable effort being put into sea defences, which means an increase in the requirement for armoured stone. Armoured stone production can be successfully achieved using a base charge of high explosive and creating a large air gap by

positioning a gasbag at stemming height.

Typically, this achieves rock sizes from six to 15 tonnes. If necessary, two decks with air gaps can be created to achieve intermediate rock sizes (four to eight tonnes). A few trial holes will establish the optimum charge and stemming height.

Environmental considerations are not the only reasons for using gasbags. A similar technique to that used to create armoured stone can be employed when pre-splitting to create smooth, stable final walls. A simple, quick and cheap method is to use air deck techniques where about 10 per cent of the hole is filled with explosive and a gasbag is placed two metres from the top (depending on the competence of the rock). Experience has shown that the spacing between holes can also be increased compared with traditional detonating cord methods.

Water is often a problem in blastholes, particularly if bulk ANFO is being used.

Sealing off up to two metres of static groundwater in a borehole can be very

Air deck techniques have a range of applications, including the production of armoured stone.

effective. The shockwave from the explosive creates a pulsed infusion effect through the water which breaks out the toe.

Gasbags can also help in maximum instantaneous charge reduction. Instead of decking the holes using chippings, a gasbag can create an air deck. The explosive will work within this air deck instead of having “dead” areas within the hole as would

happen when chippings are used. Gasbags can also be used to seal off cavities or to create extra confinement within holes as an added precaution in sensitive areas, such as close to power lines. • Steve Gilmartin is the director of Varidrill Ltd, based in the United Kingdom. Article courtesy of Quarry Management (UK). Visit agg-net.com

3D design & GPS drilling, saving time + improving safety with our integrated drill & design services

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Accuracy with GPS guidance and measure while drilling technology on our fleet of modern drill rigs servicing all areas of Australia.

Safe, fast and efficient drone survey, bench profiling and 3D design of drilling & blasting in mining, quarrying and construction - no matter the size or location of your project.

Partner with us if you are a quarrying, mining or construction company requiring professional, safe, cost effective, and prompt delivery on projects.

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6/6 Quinns Hill Road East, Stapylton QLD 4207

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info@impactdrillblast.com

DRILL & BLAST

ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY OPTIMISES

BLAST DESIGN

The Sandvik DX900i Ranger has a revolving counterweight superstructure which offers a 290-degree reach and 55m2 of coverage.

T

echnology is continuing to drive change in Australia’s quarry industry as more sophisticated equipment increases efficiency and on-site safety.

Impact Drill & Blast now has two Sandvik Ranger DX900i machines among its 40 operational surface drills – one of the largest top hammer drill fleets in Australia.

National operations manager Rob Payne said one Ranger was used across southeast Queensland while the second was stationed in the state’s north.

The Ranger has a revolving counterweight superstructure which offers a 290-degree reach and 55m2 of coverage.

After a quarry site has been surveyed with a drone, blast design software is used to create a drilling plan which is then wirelessly uploaded to the drill.

Payne said there were currently only four Rangers operating in Australia.

“The Ranger is the most technically advanced of our fleet,” he said. “It is capable of doing all of the set up and drilling by itself – about 90 per cent of the drilling operation is fully automated.

“This greatly improves site safety for workers because you don’t have people on the ground when there is other equipment working on the bench. It’s a far safer process.

“The Ranger is also very fuel-efficient, operating at a low cost per metre and offering a huge benefit to on-site operational expenses.”

Impact’s technical specialist Steve Price said 30

Quarry October 2020

the Ranger had reduced blast mark-up time by a number of hours.

“The manual process is very labour-intensive, surveying and calculating mapping points can take up to six hours on-site,” Price said. “Once the map has been created, it then needs to be manually marked out on the ground.

“In comparison, by using drone mapping and GPS, we are on-site for only about two hours, with software calculations completed back at the office.

“The GPS mapping pattern is then uploaded directly to the Ranger, which means workers no longer need to manually mark out the blasting grid with dots on the ground. This also improves safety for the Impact team as they are not exposed to mobile equipment that is working on the bench or dusty conditions.

“Using the Ranger is definitely a more precise and less labour-intensive operation, with the efficiencies allowing more work to be done in a much shorter time.”

Price said the Ranger’s on-board technology also offered a number of additional important benefits.

“If there is a geology issue on the bench and the driller can’t drill on the collar point he’s supposed to, the drill rig can relocate the collar position of that hole, calculating the depth and angle required to reach the original toe,” he said.

“The Ranger fixes it so that you can drill from any position and still reach that designed toe.

“It takes a massive burden off the driller who would otherwise have to manually remodel the

calculations on-site.”

Price said that operating automatically from an electronic drilling pattern had introduced further accuracy and efficiencies to the process.

“If you haven’t got a pattern out there on the ground, the driller can more easily manoeuvre the machine across the site, without worrying about running across dots marked on the ground,” he said.

“Because the pattern the machine is following is on the drill screen it is safer, and the driller does not have to get in and out of the rig and remark the ground as they go.

“It produces a faster and more accurate result when the track is not running over the marks and the driller is not out of the cab relining and remarking the hole position manually.”

Accuracies also extend to the drill reaching the correct floor level, even if the surface has changed since the area was mapped.

Price said the Ranger was capable of recalculating floor measurements when the ground had been disturbed during site preparations. The driller is no longer dipping holes to check the depth.

The rig also offers automatic hole-to-hole navigation, choosing the next spot from the drilling pattern and then performing the movement and alignment accordingly.

Price said the machine has a low centre of gravity – an important safety aspect which makes it more mobile with less chance of it rolling or tipping.

“The Ranger can also be operated by remote control, which takes care of safety in challenging site conditions,” he said.

“The system collects drilling data and has an option to allow the operator to add their own notes.”

Payne said Impact Drill & Blast’s business model focused on using advanced technology to improve safety and efficiency of drilling, optimise blast outcomes and improve customer operations.

One of the largest drill and blast businesses in Australia, Impact manufactures, supplies and delivers explosive products and services for the quarry, civil, underground and open-cut mining sectors. • Source: Impact Drill & Blast

DRILL & BLAST

STEMMING EJECTION CONTROL IN BLASTHOLES

H

ow do you reduce the likelihood of stemming ejection from primary production blastholes The use of stemming in blastholes enhances fragmentation and rock displacement by reducing premature venting of high-pressure explosion gases to atmosphere. There is an optimum stemming length beyond which further increments in heave energy effectiveness are not achieved.

Optimum stemming length depends mainly on hole diameter, stemming material, surrounding rock properties and other blast parameters, particularly the burden.

Inadequate stemming increases collar rock breakage, but decreases overall fragmentation and displacement because explosion gases vent to atmosphere more easily and rapidly. It also creates more flyrock, surface overbreak, noise and airblast.

Dry granular materials are best for stemming because they have inertial resistance and high frictional resistance to ejection. Materials which behave plastically or which tend to flow are not suitable for stemming, eg water, mud or wet clay. For blasthole diameters in the 50mm to 130mm range, angular crushed rock (chippings) in the approximate size range of 6mm to 14mm is the most effective stemming material.

When impulsively compressed at its lower end by the tremendous pressure of the explosion gases, crushed stone arches and wedges into the blasthole walls and provides better interlocking and confinement of the gases than, for example, relatively fine drill cuttings. This confinement maintains peak pressures in the blasthole for a longer period of time. The longer these gases can be bottled up, the more they will be able to fragment, heave and loosen the ground.

Even when all these factors are taken into account, there is still no guarantee that stemming ejection will not occur. When blasting takes place, a danger zone of sufficient size is set up such that if there is any stemming ejection, it will not cause damage and/or danger to personnel and/or equipment.

In the case of production blasting (or even toe holes) in sensitive areas such as near power lines, pipelines, cables, etc, to reduce still further the likelihood of stemming ejection,

An aerosol-type gasbag can be easily deployed and produces a very tight seal below the stemming area.

the use of stemming plugging devices should be considered. There are a number of devices on the market that could be used, including aerosol-type gasbags, mocaps and rocklocks.

Aerosol-type gasbags can be easily deployed and produce a very tight seal below the stemming area. They can easily cope with the inevitable small variations in hole diameters found in production holes.

Mocaps are hollow plastic plugs that need to be inserted into the hole using a stemming rod to push them down to the desired depth.

Since they need to be an interference fit, the choice of size is critical. In broken ground it can be difficult to obtain an effective seal. In cold conditions they become very rigid making it difficult to create a seal.

Rocklocks have the appearance of a hollow plastic ball with a small hole to allow them to be filled with stemming material. They are made from a special plastic which deforms/ flexes when gases begin to move through the stemming. They reduce the likelihood of stemming ejection by creating a frictional gas impermeable seal. They are easily deployed simply by dropping them into the blasthole, close to the bottom of the stemming. They have been widely used in the UK but are no longer manufactured there. They are now made in the US and could be shipped, subject to a minimum order (probably about 3000 units).

The use of such devices should only cost a few cents per tonne for the quantity of rock expected to be extracted in the vicinity of sensitive structures. It may also mean that areas that have been effectively sterilised

A mocap (a hollow plug) is inserted into the hole with a stemming rod to push it to the desired depth.

The hollow plastic ball-like rocklock features a small hole for filling with stemming material.

could be blasted safely in future.

Further measures that could be employed to reduce the likelihood of stemming ejection include: • Suitable initiation patterns and timings to allow adequate forward movement of the blast.

• Sleeving of the top of the hole if it is broken/cracked.

• The use of scaled depth of burial calculations.

• Doubling up of devices, eg a gasbag and a rocklock if conditions are considered marginal.

• Placing extra confinement on top of the stemmed hole. • Julian Cleeton is a director of Stemtek, based in the UK. Article courtesy of Quarry Management (UK). Visit agg-net.com

Quarry October 2020 31

PLANT DESIGN

MODULAR PLANT

BOLSTERS GOLD PRODUCTION A modular crushing and screening plant solution is playing a vital role in delivering production capacity for a New South Wales gold processing operation.

D

argues Gold Mine is located at Majors Creek in New South Wales, about 60km southeast of Canberra. The ore body was originally discovered in the early 1870s and was recently studied and identified as capable of supporting a viable underground mining operation. Owner Diversified Minerals is a leading underground mining services company within the Australian resources sector. This project is the first new gold plant to be approved in NSW in 10 years.

The team at Terex Jaques worked closely with DRA Global, an engineering design and construction house contracted by Diversified Minerals, to design and install the crushing and screening plant.

DRA Global approached Terex Jaques to design and develop a cost-effective modular crushing and screening plant with a quick set-up time to deliver the required production capacity to feed the gold processing plant downstream.

The system components designed and manufactured by Terex include four modules: a MJ42 jaw crusher module with tipping grid, two MC1000 cone crusher modules with overhead surge bins and vibrating pan feeders, and a MHS6203 screen module. These modules are based off the pre-engineered modular product 32

Quarry October 2020

The primary station set-up with tipping grid, a self-cleaning magnet, secondary and tertiary cone crusher modules and a conveyor.

line offered by Terex Jaques and customengineered to fit the needs of the Dargues Gold Mine. Also included in the modular plant is a conveyor package consisting of a main feed conveyor, return conveyors to the cone crushers and a product conveyor feeding a large ore bin, primary station dust suppression, two self-cleaning magnets and a metal detector.

PRIMARY JAW CRUSHER The Terex MJ42 modular jaw crusher features the rugged JW42 jaw crusher for high production. Its hydraulically actuated wedge system allows closed side setting (CSS) adjustments to be made quickly and easily.

The crusher utilises heavy-duty components for optimum operation and long life. The module includes a vibrating pan and grizzly

feeder with under jaw crusher conveyor. The 15m3 capacity hopper incorporates a tipping grid which protects the system from large oversize feed material. The jaw module has a fully galvanised bolt-together frame structure which allows for quick set-up time and comes with a pre-wired plug and play electrical control panel. Dust suppression is located at the tipping grid, over jaw crusher, under-jaw crusher and MJ42 discharge conveyor.

MC1000 CONE CRUSHERS The MC1000 modular cone crusher handles an all-in-feed for continuous crushing. Its 1000mm cone has a full range of crushing chamber configurations to match short and long throw. The all-roller bearing design delivers enhanced crushing efficiency. Each cone module has a hopper with surge bins

and vibrating pan feeders to regulate the flow of material to the cone crushers, providing safe control of the material while keeping the cone appropriately choke-fed. The cone module comes with an easy-bolt together structure for quick set-up time and ease of access around the crusher, surge bin and vibrating pan feeder for maintenance purposes.

MHS6203 SCREEN The MHS6203 modular horizontal screen features the extremely efficient 1.8m x 6.1m, three-deck Cedarapids TSV horizontal screen with its legendary ElJay oval stroke action. The module consists of galvanised steel structures including walkways, stairs and guard rails for safe and easy access to maintain components with quick set-up time.

Also supplied as part of the screen module is a discharge chute with blending capabilities, an under-screen fines conveyor and a prewired plug and play electrical control panel.

MODULAR PLANT CONVEYORS The modular plant consists of five main conveyors. The main feed conveyor collects product from the jaw crusher and two cone crushers and feeds directly onto the MHS6203 screen module. Return conveyors from the screen module carry oversize back to the secondary and tertiary cone crushers. A transfer conveyor from the screen module sends final crushed ore product out to a transfer point and onto the product conveyor which feeds directly into a large final ore bin.

Also incorporated in the modular plant are two self-cleaning magnets and a metal detector to protect the crushers.

The operation at Dargues Gold Mine commenced in April 2020 with plans to process 330,000 tonnes of gold ore per annum. The plant is designed to produce a high grade sulphide concentrate. The end result is a state of the art, modern, environmentally friendly gold processing facility designed on the principles of ecologically sustainable development that will boast a very small surface footprint.

CRUSHING, SCREENING SOLUTIONS The modular and portable plants and static components offered by Terex Jaques are designed to work as one complete crushing and screening system. Modular and portable plants provide a pre-engineered solution that can be quickly and easily installed into new or existing installations while allowing for the flexibility required for the unique needs of an application or location.

The Terex Jaques applications team has years of valuable crushing and screening experience and can offer quarry producers expert guidance in choosing the right equipment for an efficient, cost-effective system. The support isn’t limited to installation. The team is available throughout the working life of every piece of equipment to provide advice, maintenance, and parts support for operational reliability and productivity.

Source: Terex Jaques

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PLANT DESIGN

INNOVATIVE WALKWAY

DESIGNS THAT IMPROVE SAFETY When it comes to plant design and maintenance, ensuring your equipment is in working order is vital. Equally as vital is the support structures around your crushing and screening plant. Have you given much thought to making your metal walkways as safe as possible?

M

etal walkway gratings are versatile and dependable flooring options.

Their unique design, durability and the many safety features incorporated into them by skilled manufacturers keeps employees safe and work moving at the right pace.

There are plenty of reasons why businesses turn to metal walkway grating when designing new facilities and renovating old ones. Air circulation, resistance to corrosion, sure footing for workers and other benefits are all possible with the right type of grating. Of course, unique aesthetic benefits can also come into play in a variety of ways. Consider these potential uses as you seek out effective flooring for your project.

ACCESSING RAISED SURFACES, EQUIPMENT, MACHINERY Warehouses, factories and similar facilities frequently have multiple levels where employees have to travel to complete their duties. While standard staircases and partial flooring can fulfil basic requirements for access, metal walkway gratings are especially effective. Consider these safetyfocused benefits: • A metal walkway grating designed for 34

Quarry October 2020

industrial use includes a substantial emphasis on safety. Cleats in the metal offer increased slip resistance.

• A serrated profile surface for increased traction and employee safety that is especially effective in wet conditions. It is also useful in areas where the grating slopes.

• Kickplating, which can prevent objects that land near the edge of the walkway grating from falling to areas below the elevated surface.

• Mesh underneath the grating is an effective option for catching objects small enough to fall through the grating, resulting in a similar advantage.

These safety benefits are relevant whether the metal walkway gratings are used slightly above ground level or many storeys in the air inside a large warehouse or production plant.

PROTECTING AGAINST RUST, CORROSION Industrial facilities may regularly utilise harsh chemicals that could discolour, weaken or otherwise damage standard flooring. That’s especially true if the chemicals pool in a specific area and aren’t quickly cleaned up.

Water and moisture do not have as much

potential for short-term danger in terms of corrosion and damage but can negatively impact a walkway or flooring over time. This is another area where metal walkway gratings, specifically those made of stainless steel, excel.

Because stainless steel and its variants are specifically designed to resist corrosion, a stainless steel walkway grating can increase longevity and improve safety in areas where chemical spills cannot always be avoided.

And in places where exposure to moisture - whether within a facility or outdoors - is inevitable, stainless steel provides a similar benefit. There are other options for corrosion resistant walkway gratings as well, including anodised aluminium.

INCREASING VISIBILITY, CIRCULATION Another key aspect to keep in mind when using metal gratings on elevated surfaces is light and visibility. Solid platforms and staircases limit light flow from the top of the building and may require the placement of additional fixtures to provide a safe level of visibility, depending on the circumstances.

Metal grating allows more light to shine through and provide more even coverage to the areas below.

Similarly, airflow can be a concern in many structures. Metal grating allows HVAC systems and fans to work more efficiently, providing gaps where air can flow freely.

These benefits are broadly applicable. In industrial contexts, a certain level of light and airflow may be required for employees to safely go about their work and produce high quality results. In commercial structures, the advantages may have more to do with aesthetics than safety rules and regulations.

Metal walkway grating is versatile enough to support specific goals across a wide range of building types and uses.

CREATING AN ENGAGING ATMOSPHERE Metal walkway grating is traditionally seen in areas where safety and durability is a major concern, namely industrial spaces like warehouses and factories. This view makes plenty of sense but overlooks what metal grating can do in other applications where design and visual identity are important and special safety needs often aren’t present.

Utilising a metal walkway, ramp or staircase in a commercial building like a shopping centre or office complex can help create a more memorable environment with a simple design change. Versatility in terms of choosing finishes for the walkway grating and painting the surrounding handrail and support system can help create the best visual appearance for the setting.

FINDING A DEPENDABLE PROVIDER The quality of metal walkway grating is deeply tied to the skill and experience of the manufacturer that produces it. A skilled supplier provides consistent results that you can count on, which is vital whether your choice of metal walkway grating is based on aesthetic qualities or a need to emphasise workplace safety.

Webforge, part of the Valmont group, has the skill, knowledge and production capacity to provide the highest quality metal walkway grating for any project.

SAFER ACCESS ON WALKWAYS, RAMPS Webforge grating is used for walkways, platforms and stairways, providing safe access solutions in any industry.

In accordance with Australian Standard AS1657, walkways with an incline of 10 degrees or more must utilise cleats for increased slip resistance.

Webforge can supply 10mm square pre-welded cleats at prescribed intervals to suit the specific application. A variety of anti-slip nosing options are also available for stair treads, suitable for walkway and ramp applications.

The serrated profile surface is another option to consider for improved slip resistance on sloping or wet areas.

Webforge grating profiles are available in plain or serrated surface patterns. The choice of grating material is dependent on the environmental conditions of the application.

For example, the potential for corrosion and level of exposure to water will influence the decision.

PLANT DESIGN

The walkway meets the requirements of Australian Standard ANZ 1657.

When specifying walkways and ramps, load bars can span either across or along the flow of traffic, depending upon support orientations. Typical panel lengths of up to 5.8m maximum can potentially provide significant savings.

Webforge can work with quarry producers to achieve the best result for their projects, including on outline drawings, panel sizes (if rectangular or square), banding requirements, span direction and finish.

BENEFITS OF STAINLESS STEEL GRATES Stainless steel grates are an indispensable component of constructing safe and functional industrial facilities. When appropriately designed and installed, these reliable support surfaces help workers consistently complete their duties and mitigate the possibility of accidents on the job. Long life spans, the ability to support a range of activities based on the specific configuration of the grate and other benefits combine to make stainless steel grates a strong choice for industrial and commercial facilities across the modern economy.

Learning more about the specific benefits of stainless steel can help quarry producers make the most informed decision possible for your project and organisation. There are four 36

Quarry October 2020

key reasons why stainless steel grates are so beneficial to the businesses that utilise them.

1. STRENGTH Steel’s strength is a core property recognised in a variety of design and construction contexts, from a skyscraper or industrial facility’s columns and girders to its widespread use as grating. It has a high tensile strength compared to many other metals, meaning it can withstand heavy weight and pressure before starting to stretch out and deform. This is especially important for elevated walkways, staircases, mezzanines and similar structures, where the steel and the structure it is attached to are the only things keeping employees safely working at heights.

Steel and its many variations have different strength ratings depending on the specific composition of the final product. Stainless steel is strong enough to support a variety of industrial applications and comes with other benefits that make it a leading choice among the many options offered. Along with strength, businesses should also keep corrosion resistance in mind.

2. CORROSION RESISTANCE Basic steel is an alloy comprised of iron and carbon to create a stronger, more durable

metal than iron is by itself. Stainless steel is an alloy made by taking the basic formula for steel and incorporating other elements like chromium and, sometimes molybdenum, to improve corrosion resistance. Basic steel can suffer significant corrosion over time when it is regularly exposed to air and moisture. This results in cosmetic issues, namely rusting, and safety issues over time. As rust flakes away, the underlying steel will begin to rust.

Ultimately, the steel will lose its structural integrity and pose a major safety issue for those who walk on it, carry out tasks near machinery made of it or work in buildings where steel components are exposed to air and moisture.

Stainless steel, in contrast, will develop a thin film in response to the onset of corrosion that prevents the spread of rust. The resistance to corrosion offered by stainless steel is what sets it apart from the many other varieties currently manufactured. The ability to resist rust and maintain its integrity helps stainless steel last longer and continue functioning safely in its intended role. A variety of stainless steel alloys are available to address different conditions present in a variety of facilities.

Corrosion resistance is especially important for stainless steel grating because of the many types of environments the material may

be exposed to in an industrial workplace.

Even in climate controlled facilities, ambient moisture content and the presence of oxygen can eventually lead to rusting and the issues that come along with it. With stainless steel’s corrosion resistance and its underlying strength, quarry producers can be far more confident in the reliability of the grating.

3. RESISTANCE TO FIRE, HEAT Stainless steel’s overall reputation for dependability is tied to its strong performance in the face of adverse conditions. Along with its ability to remain functional in conditions that would corrode other types of steel, it also stands up well to other adverse events such as impacts, excess heat and fire. While every well managed organisation takes careful steps to avoid accidents, an unpredictable series of events can lead to an emergency. Stainless steel grating that resists the damage caused by heat and fire can avoid further damage in these situations.

In less catastrophic circumstances,

resistance to heat can help stainless steel, especially protective barriers. Walkways too remain more durable in industrial conditions where high heat is an unavoidable element of operations. This helps improve safety considerations and reduces the costs associated with repair and replacement.

4. CUSTOM-MADE A dependable and safe material only becomes useful when it can be consistently fabricated and installed in a way that meets the unique needs of a variety of different facilities.

Stainless steel is broadly customisable, both in terms of the specific content of the alloy and the ways in which it can be manufactured.

While there are recommendations and rules set by the International Organisation for Standardisation, Standards Australia and similar national rules authorities in terms of how to construct steel grating with safety in mind, many other elements of steel grating are easily changed to align with specific design requirements and the layout of a facility.

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Whether it’s a need to retrofit an existing building or address a unique layout and the needs of a specific industry, stainless steel gratings can be made to order for a perfect fit in nearly every situation. No matter the specifics, stainless steel can support a producer’s operations with both pre-made panels and bespoke pieces.

Finding the right provider to supply a project is crucial when it comes to stainless steel grating. A dependable partner can help a producer work through the entire process, from selecting the right existing panel option or crafting custom elements from scratch - to producing and transporting it to the existing facility or construction site.

Webforge can help organisations select all of the necessary elements and associated hardware, from choosing the right slip resistance features to ensuring the most effective fixing clips are provided to help secure the grating. • Source: Webforge, a Valmont company

LOAD & HAUL

HATCON:

THE FLEET MANAGEMENT APP IN THE PALM OF YOUR HAND An original equipment manufacturer has developed a data-focused solution that allows attachments and tools in a quarry producer’s fleet to be monitored via an app available on computers, tablets and smartphones.

K

nowing the ins and outs of a quarry operation is important to maintain seamless performance at the site.

Epiroc’s Hydraulic Attachment Tools Connectivity (HATCON) provides an enhanced, digital alternative to fleet management. It is available as a factorymounted or retrofit hydraulic attachment kit for breakers and drum cutters.

HATCON’s data can be integrated into fleets to monitor operating hours, location and service intervals of attachments. This data can then be accessed anywhere with an internet connection via My Epiroc from a computer, tablet or phone.

HATCON also enables service notifications to be transmitted directly to a personal device for added peace of mind and also features a GPS function with three years of licensing that can send an anti-theft alert.

FLEET MANAGEMENT SOLUTION Released earlier this year, HATCON represents a brand new fleet managing solution for the quarrying industry. Epiroc’s Glenn Illingworth told Quarry that HATCON has been used in Epiroc’s German hire fleet for several years to gradually develop the HATCON solution with in-house software but is now being “released to the public as an option”.

“The software is all in-house,” Illingworth said. “We had a hire fleet and it was important to know where that fleet was, so we needed a GPS component.”

According to Illingworth, the design of the HATCON device had to be considered to withstand the demanding conditions of an extractive industries environment.

“There’s a lot of forces applied on a hydraulic attachment so you need to find something robust enough to withstand that and still be able to extract the data that you want,” he said.

38

Quarry October 2020

HATCON’s data can be accessed via My Epiroc on any device with an internet connection: a computer, tablet or phone. Service notifications can also be transmitted directly to any of these personal devices.

HATCON can be factory-fitted when ordering Epiroc’s medium and heavy breakers, as well as its drum cutters, and can also be easily retrofitted to other Epiroc breakers.

“They can be retrofitted by us or the customer can retrofit it themselves, it’s not complicated,” Illingworth said. “In simple terms, you reduce your maintenance cost.

It comes with any new medium and heavy breaker, and the Erkat drum cutters free of charge.”

A MULTI-BRAND SOLUTION? In theory, HATCON can be installed on hydraulic attachments from other brands but Illingworth explained choosing Epiroc enables customers to unlock the full potential of the breakers and hammers.

For one, the older breakers and hammers don’t have pre-drilled holes to be able to mount the devices. “Every new hammer and drum cutter manufactured already has these pre-drilled holes,” Illingworth said.

“We have a 3G/4G signal that we upload – it goes to the cloud-based Certiq system which is again part of Epiroc and from that system, it’s downloaded into the My Epiroc software.”

While data is central to HATCON, Illingworth said that it can only be seen by the user. “This is for the customer,” he said. “We cannot see the data, they can only see it. We administer access in terms of the user, but after that, we don’t have access to the information.”

PREVENTATIVE MAINTENANCE HATCON uses this data to alert customers

about service intervals to prevent costly repairs.

“In a quarry situation, a quarry in Melbourne shares the breaker between quarries,” Illingworth said. “It monitors hours, it sets service intervals, to encourage the customer to do preventative maintenance and avoids expensive repair bills through failures.

“If you allow them to run until they stop working, obviously the cost of that is much more than preventative maintenance.”

The devices are also battery-operated to enable remote access, and feature an antitheft alarm from the My Epiroc software.

“Battery life is roughly three years depending on how often you upload the information,” Illingworth said. “There’s an alarm attached to that, that gives you a warning when the battery is getting flat. It is also tamper-proof, so if someone tries to remove it, it will also set off an alarm.

“As part of the My Epiroc software, you are also able to upload your service information,

HATCON monitors the hours recorded on a hydraulic breaker or drum cutter within a quarrying environment, and based on working hours, can recommend the period for a service interval of the attachment.

so you can see the service history. Operators can also raise any issue from the mobile app back to their office, let’s say they need to replace a tool or more hammer grease.”

The preventative maintenance encouraged by the HATCON system also allows for services and maintenance planning to be scheduled more efficiently via My Epiroc which adds to the return on investment.

“You can now plan for services and maintenance much more efficiently,” Illingworth said. “Support is through our experienced stocking dealer network backed up by our distribution centre in Sydney.

“This system enables the operators to pre-plan and for the distributors to meet deadline and will reduce unplanned stoppages and downtime.”

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Loaded by: Hex 1 Product: Shot Rock Dump Location: Primary Crusher

LOAD & HAUL

STRONG INVESTMENT RETURN The My Epiroc app has a number of perks to improve a producer’s fleet management system beyond what the HATCON device can provide, such as loading service information, selecting a “favourite” in the fleet, and location mapping and tracking.

“You’re able to have this software on all of your various media such as your laptop, computer, phone and tablet,” Illingworth said. “The operator can send a signal that is picked up on the media. All this data can be collated on My Epiroc.”

Illingworth said My Epiroc also has more features in the pipeline, such as the ability to order new parts via the app. This adds to the value of integrating a site’s machines into Epiroc’s hardware and software systems.

“We have another system called DocMine – through MyEpiroc, you can link to DocMine and order new parts,” he said.” In future, you’ll be able to go to your applicable parts list via serial number. This means it will be a more user-friendly, time-efficient system.”

The HATCON device (pictured) is a factory-mounted or retrofitted hydraulic attachment kit for breakers and drum cutters on an excavator.

Whether the HATCON system is preinstalled or retrofitted, Illingworth is confident that it provides a strong return of investment for customers. And while it is fresh to the market, HATCON has already been considered a valuable option to a civil construction customer.

“If they’re buying a new breaker, their investment return is straight away because we will provide HATCON free of charge – as part of the cost of the breaker,” he said.

“If it’s an existing customer who already has a breaker in the field, there will be a minimal cost but they should get that return back in the first year because they will be able

to plan and schedule, and have a planned preventative service.

“It’s a bit like changing the oil in your engine – you wouldn’t let it seize up.”

Illingworth said HATCON’s monitoring of hydraulic breakers and drum cutters is just the first part of the device’s potential.

“The first stage for us was hydraulic breakers and Erkat drum cutters,” he said.

“Second stage will be other attachments in our range. It’s not ‘one fits all’, you obviously need different readers, depending on the product.” •

By Nickolas Zakharia

Industries P/L

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SMART BUSINESS

WINDOWS OF OPPORTUNITY FOR OPERATIONAL IMPROVEMENT

F

rom autonomous drilling and conveyor belt sensors to truck fleet management and aerial volume measurement platforms, quarries and aggregate production plants are creating virtual stockpiles of data.

However, while these data producing systems are helping drive productivity for boots on the ground, they are typically not connected in a way that can help support operational objectives. Nor are they able to resolve challenges including rising production demands, tighter specifications, employee recruiting and retention to safety and regulatory compliance.

The only way to address these concerns is through improved process management.

At its most basic, quarrying is a three-step manufacturing operation – extraction, material processing and loading. And much like any manufacturing activity, LEAN and Six Sigma techniques enable the identification and removal of waste and minimise impact variability. As many operations have learned, you can’t improve what you can’t measure.

However, despite the ongoing investment in systems such as belt scale sensors and fleet management, managers do not have an easy way to compile data about specific operational activities to derive actionable insights.

CONNECTIVITY CONUNDRUM Tracking material production, equipment productivity and personnel performance is considerably easier in today’s environment with so many sensors – but gaining valuable intel from all that data is trickier, and something that the entire construction industry struggles with.

Studies have found that a large percentage of the data captured by engineering and construction firms goes unused, largely due to lack of connectivity, a challenge that quarry managers and aggregate producers will increasingly face.

Much like a project manager relies on an overarching solution to bring together progress data from a jobsite, quarry and aggregate producers should begin to think about quarry workflow-relevant reporting tools and dashboards. These reporting tools draw data from sensors and systems from scales on loaders, excavators, haul

As the Trimble Insight tool can be connected to scales across a quarrying operation, it can provide valuable insights from extraction to load-out.

trucks and conveyor belts into a centralised location, where it is organised into valuable intel. By measuring data from load and haul, processing, load-out processes and stockpiles, a producer can quickly see what is produced and isolate any opportunities for improvement.

A reporting tool such as Trimble Insight gathers and sorts data and then incorporates key pieces of information (depending on the user) into real-time dashboards to support decision-making and production planning. By measuring load-out and processing totals, a producer can see what is produced and isolate opportunities for improvement.

The same tool can help crews manage production by pulling belt scale data – including product type, production rates and locations – into a single source to show target versus actual productivity and identify downtime delays. Similarly, a report on blast yield tonnage to verify that blasting patterns and hauling cycles are delivering expected yield can be compiled with data from belt scales and machine monitoring systems.

OPERATIONAL REALITIES The ability to monitor operations is bridging the gap between intuition and hard data. A reporting tool confirms and reinforces an operator’s expertise, providing information in a manner that is accurate, timely and easy to visualise.

Since the Trimble Insight tool is connected to scales across the operation, it can provide valuable insights from extraction to loadout. It’s a single source of truth. With such a system, a producer can quickly see how improving a certain aspect of operations – such as adding new equipment – improves production or the bottom line.

A quarry production monitoring system enables information in real-time to highlight an opportunity that could minimise lost production time or reduced performance.

It’s an opportunity to look through a different set of lenses – in essence, a direct window into operations at any given moment, along with the historical data to drive actionable decisions. And it is information that is available anytime, anywhere from a connected device.

Many sites already have the hardware infrastructure in place – it just needs to be connected to an intelligent reporting system and there are specialists that can advise and assist with connectivity like Trimble authorised dealers nationwide.

Do more than collect data – drive decisions through a connected workflow.

For more information about Trimble Insight, or a free demo, visit trimbleinsight.com • Chris van der Loo is a business area director of Trimble Weighing & Aggregates. Email: chris_ vanderloo@trimble.com

Quarry October 2020 41

SMART BUSINESS

FINALISING THE KEY

ACCOUNT PLANNING PROCESS In this final article on the Key Account Planning process, Mike Cameron outlines how sales and marketing personnel should ‘close the deal’ with a client, taking into account their sales objectives, stop signs and alternative position proposals.

T

he previous three articles laid the foundation for understanding the importance of: • A good sales strategy – namely, to set yourself up in the right position, ie to be in the right place, with the right people, at the right time, with the right solution so that you can make the right tactical presentation to achieve your sales objective.

• Creating a framework through a Key Account Plan (KAP) that fosters a winwin situation and manages every sales objective as a joint venture.

• Identifying strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats in term of your relationships with buyers within your customer’s or prospect’s organisation.

In this final article, we complete the review of the process for developing key accounts.

However, just to recap the summary of strengths (Step 4 in the process), at the conclusion of the third article:

and attitudes of each buyer within your prospect’s organisation.

3. Eliminate stop signs by leveraging a strength.

4. Don’t become disenchanted or despondent as a result of the large number of stop signs that you’ve identified.

Congratulate yourself and set action steps to eliminate them. You should view this as an opportunity to leverage from strength as you clear them.

SUMMARY OF STRENGTHS 1. Key accounts differentiate your solution and your company from competitors.

2. They are opportunities to improve your position (strategy).

3. They are relevant to the current Sales Objective within the KAP 4. They diminish the importance of price competition.

It has been noted that many people, even the very best of sales professionals, don’t leverage from strength as often as they could or should – an important observation to keep in mind as you review and redraft your action plan and reposition yourself as and whenever necessary.

ASSESSMENT USING OBJECTIVE CRITERIA Place a stop sign in any box within the Buying Influences Chart above (Figure 1) or your own chart, when evaluating the action steps within your KAP for which you have not identified at least one player.

Place a stop sign next to the name of any of the following players: 1. Anyone about whom you have insufficient data or about whom you have a question that you can’t answer.

2. Anyone about whom the information you have is unclear or uncertain.

3. Any uncovered base, ie any buyer who has yet to be contacted or spoken to.

4. Any new player.

5. Any player involved in a recent or current corporate reorganisation.

Once you have identified your stop signs, begin looking for areas of strength from which you can use leverage to remove them, eg:

ELIMINATING STOP SIGNS : DOS AND DON’TS 1. Don’t ignore stop signs.

2. Don’t be overconfident about your current position and understanding of the needs 42

Quarry October 2020

Figure 1. Buying Influence Chart.

1. Which of your buyers are most enthusiastic about your proposal?

2. Which of them can be utilised as an advocate?

3. Have you spoken to these people yet about helping you move to a stronger position?

Finally, review your strengths and then test your position, eg: 1. Does this particular strength clearly differentiate your company from the competition?

2. Does this particular strength relate directly to your current sales objective?

3. Will leveraging from this strength improve your position regarding your current sales objective?

Each question must be answered “Yes” for you to have a true strength. Be careful about only being comfortable around people you have known the longest. To be positioned to win, be sure you have covered all the key players filling all four of the buyer modes.

REVISE ‘ALTERNATIVE POSITION’ PROPOSALS You should now take the information you have just acquired to revise and expand on your alternative position proposals. It is highly likely that you will have already reviewed and revised these proposals several times and, as a result, you will have transformed them into a working proposition for your action plan.

Note: As you re-evaluate your thinking, be inclusive, be specific, frequently check out the relevance of your alternative position proposals with other team members, your prospect’s advocates and already supportive buyers prior to discussing it with less committed people.

Inclusive means that you should include as much as possible. Don’t worry about whether every one of your alternative position proposals is ideal for the situation.

Being specific means that you should test to check that you are not being theoretical about

your alternative position proposals.

Note: Each item must relate specifically to your current sales objective.

Set SMART Action Steps within your KAP, eg: I will arrange a meeting on Wednesday, 12 June at 10.30am, for Jack Smith to show Rob Jones how our proposal can increase productivity within his department by 15 per cent over the next 12 months.

While this action won’t ensure that you win their business, it does enhance your credibility as well as eliminating a stop sign.

If an alternative position proposal is not important or it isn’t a high priority for your customer’s buyers at the moment, you can always reassess the situation at a later time or when changed circumstances demand a review. Use the leverage principle over and over as you work your way towards your current sales objective and frequently test your current assumptions.

Note: Test means you need to test every alternative position proposal. You should never make an unwarranted assumption that any

action you propose will be a change for the better, as far as your prospect or customer’s buyers are concerned.

Every alternative position proposal that you create, and are prepared to test, should do one of the following: 1. Capitalise on an area of strength.

2. Eliminate a stop sign or at least reduce the impact that it may represent.

STEP 5. CREATE AN ACTION PLAN A: IDENTIFY EACH INDIVIDUAL’S RESPONSE MODE Review your Buying Influence Chart (Figure 1) and focus on how each buyer feels about the situation and the change your alternative position proposal brings. Ask yourself and your team: “Can our proposal close the perceived gap (discrepancy) between reality and results?” Then, on your chart, write the following letters alongside each of your buyers to represent how you believe they feel about the situation, your proposal and/or solution (your sales objective):

• G – for growth.

• T – trouble.

• S – satisfied.

• O – optimistic.

You may be unsure about how a particular buyer feels which is why a stop sign would be in order. A buyer may feel S (satisfied) today but they may feel T (trouble) tomorrow, which is why you need to constantly review and reevaluate the situation.

B: RANKING A BUYER’S INTEREST IN YOUR PROPOSAL Once you have labelled each buyer’s response mode, assess where you stand with each of them by asking yourself this question: “How does each person feel right now with regard to my current sales proposal?”

Note: You are finding out how the buyer feels about your proposal, not you or your company.

Rate your buyers between -5 and +5 and mark up your assessments against the buyers’ names within your Buying Influence Chart (see Figure 2).

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SMART BUSINESS

Figure 2. How to rate your buyers between -5 and +5 within your Buying Influence Chart.

Figure 3. Example of an updated Buying Influence Chart.

The goal of this process is to identify how each buyer views your proposal on a scale of +5 to -5.

Anyone with whom you have yet to discuss the proposal or those buyers who are negative to it should be marked with a stop sign. You need to develop a strategy to deal with all the people you have marked with a stop sign since they have the potential to block, or at least stall, your proposal.

As a matter of some urgency, and prior to working on additional proposal alternatives, you will need to rectify this gap in your knowledge base. Where you can’t do this, you have a risk.

Note: Anyone with a -1 to a -5 rating requires a stop sign.

C: ANALYSE YOUR INFORMATION Since you have now assessed each buyer twice, once in terms of modes and again in terms of their overall feelings about your proposal, compare these two assessments and then determine your current strengths and weaknesses based on the visual model that you’ve created.

Look for inconsistencies. If your buyer is optimistic and has a +3 rating, you have an inconsistency. If you have an advocate who is not in favour of your proposal then reconsider where you are placing this person within the chart or seriously review your data and reevaluate your current position.

Note: The best advocates are usually in growth mode but, in any event, they have to 44

Quarry October 2020

Figure 4. Example of a Buyers’ Win Results Chart.

be in either growth or trouble mode.

Think not only about how the various buyers relate individually to you, but how each specific response assists you to create a composite picture of your customer’s overall response to your proposal. Again, the number of buyers in growth or trouble modes constitutes one of your most significant strengths.

D: REVISE YOUR ALTERNATIVE POSITIONS PROPOSALS Review each Alternative Position proposal and ask yourself this question: “How does the level of receptivity of each of my buyers

affect the visibility of this option?”

Based on the answers you get to the above question, modify those options that should be modified, dump those that are no longer valid and add any new options that will move towards and/or meet the better understood, newly perceived or revised requirements of your buyers.

Then continue to (i) consider all options and be inclusive, (ii) be specific, and (iii) test your alternative position proposals by making sure that each one capitalises on a strength, eliminates or reduces the impact of a stop sign, or does both.

STEP 6. THE CLOSE Keep it simple (Don’t find that you have bought your own solution).Ensure that paperwork and your process is “painless”.

The Ten Steps of the Business Review & Development Process

STEP 7. SEEK FEEDBACK, REVIEW FUTURE OPPORTUNITIES Consider utilising the following business review and development (BRAD) process from experience, it works a treat!

Finally, to reiterate, in diagrammatic form, the key take-aways from the four articles which detailed the process of creating and managing a KAP, they are: • Select or train a suitably qualified sales professional.

• Appreciate that a KAP has six key components.

• Understand the value of a standard procedure for creating multiple Key Account Plans.

• Ensure that everyone within the sales team is trained in how to create a KAP and manage the seven steps involved in the process (See Figure 5).

THE SEVEN KEY STEPS: Step 1 Decide what you are selling.

Understand your sales objective.

Step 2 Test your position and identify buyers.

Understand your customer base.

Understand your customer’s organisational chart.

Identify buyers.

Step 3 Rate and evaluate your buyers.

Buyers’ roles.

Buyers’ influence.

Interest in your sales objective.

Step 4 Identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.

Review alternative positions.

Step 5 Create an action plan.

Draft and implement SMART action steps.

Step 6 Close the deal.

Ensure that paperwork and your process is “painless”.

Step 7 Monitor and seek feedback.

Monitor delivery.

Check that delivery meets (or exceeds) the promise.

Seek feedback from your customer’s buyers.

Review future business opportunities (BRAD meeting).

Nurture the relationship. • Mike Cameron is an IQA member and the principal of Strategically Yours. Visit strategically.com.au

Figure 5. Ten steps of the BRAD process.

Figure 6. A sales relationship diagram.

Quarry October 2020 45

Some jurisdictions in Australia have amended their work health and safety laws to make industrial manslaughter an offence.

REGULATION

BRISBANE COMPANY FIRST TO BE CONVICTED OF INDUSTRIAL MANSLAUGHTER

W

orkplace fatalities are tragic and devastating events. In order to reflect the seriousness of these incidents, some jurisdictions across Australia have amended their work health and safety laws to establish the offence of industrial manslaughter, where the negligent conduct by a person conducting a business or undertaking (PCBU) or officers causes the death of a worker.

Victoria is the most recent state to introduce new offences of workplace manslaughter with amendments to the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004 (Vic), commencing from 1 July, 2020. Victoria now joins other States and Territories with industrial manslaughter laws including the Australian Capital Territory, Queensland and the Northern Territory.

The effect of these provisions is already starting to be seen, with a Brisbane autowrecking company becoming the first PCBU to be convicted under the industrial manslaughter provisions of the Work Health and Safety Act 2011 (Qld Act). The Qld Act was amended in 2017 to create new offences of industrial manslaughter by a PCBU or a senior officer whose negligent conduct causes the death of a worker.

In R v Brisbane Auto Recycling Pty Ltd & Ors [2020] QDC 113, the Queensland District Court had to determine the penalty to be imposed on the PCBU and its two directors who were each separately convicted of a Category One offence of reckless conduct for engaging in conduct that exposed an individual to a risk of death or serious injury or illness and were reckless as to that risk.

In May 2019, the worker had just returned to the work premises after collecting a vehicle with a tilt tray truck. Two forklifts were operating around the delivery area, moving car bodies around to make way for the new vehicle the worker had delivered. The worker suffered a fatal injury after a forklift operator reversed, pinning and crushing the worker 46

Quarry October 2020

between the back of the forklift and the tilt tray.

An ambulance was immediately called, and it was reported that the worker had fallen from the truck. One of the directors later discovered after reviewing CCTV footage that the worker was crushed by a forklift but did not report this to Queensland Police and the regulator, Workplace Health and Safety Queensland.

The directors were also initially reluctant to provide the worker’s daughter with the CCTV footage and even proposed to put forward a different version of events of how the worker suffered injury.

In the subsequent investigation conducted

by WHSQ, it was revealed that: • The PCBU did not have any written safety policies or procedures in place.

• There was no traffic management plan for the worksite.

• The forklift operator did not hold a high risk work licence to operate a forklift and no checks were done to ensure that forklift operators were appropriately licensed.

• The forklift operator was inexperienced, and no assessment was conducted of his competency to operate a forklift.

• The PCBU did not have a WorkCover policy in place.

The PCBU pleaded guilty and was convicted of industrial manslaughter while the directors also pleaded guilty and each had convictions recorded for the Category One offences.

The industrial manslaughter offence under the Qld Act attracts a maximum penalty of $10 million for a corporation, while the maximum penalty for a Category One offence is $300,000 or five years’ imprisonment.

In determining the appropriate penalty, the District Court had regard to the following: •T he lack of safety systems in place.

•T he availability of simple steps to minimise or remove the risk of mobile plant.

• The modest cost of implementing safety measures.

• That the directors accepted that they knew of the risk but consciously dismissed it.

• The directors sought to deflect responsibility for the incident.

• The extended period in which workers were placed at risk.

• The loss of life and impact on the worker’s family.

• The PCBU’s and directors’ capacity to pay a fine.

• The prevalence of fatalities caused by forklifts.

• The prospect of deportation faced by the directors, who were in Australia on residency visas, and the resultant hardship on their families.

The District Court noted that while the PCBU did not have capacity to pay a significant fine, this did not mean that an appropriate fine should not be imposed. Accordingly, it ordered the PCBU to pay a fine of $3 million. The District Court also held that it was appropriate to sentence each director to 10 months’ imprisonment, to be wholly suspended for 20 months.

LESSONS FOR EMPLOYERS Work health and safety legislation seeks to ensure the health and safety of workers while they are at work and for workers to return home with their faculties, limbs and lives intact.

This decision is the first prosecution under Queensland’s industrial manslaughter laws, however, with the introduction of industrial manslaughter offences in a number of Australian jurisdictions, including most recently, Victoria, it is important that employers are aware of their safety obligations and ensure that work health safety systems are in place. • Source: Workplace Law

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IQA NEWS

Paul Carlon from Leverlink presented on ‘stored energy’ engineering technology.

BRANCH AGMS The Queensland branch’s 2020-21 committee was sworn in on 25 August.

QUEENSLAND BRANCH AGM On 25 August, the Queensland branch successfully held its first face to face event since the beginning of the COVID-19 restrictions. More than 60 people attended the branch AGM and dinner meeting held at the Brisbane Racing Club Doomben Racecourse, where Paul Carlon from Leverlink presented on “Stored energy” engineering technology.

Queensland branch members clearly welcomed the opportunity to reconnect following the postponement of a number of events.

• Brad Rooney (Victoria).

• James Collings (NSW).

• Adrian Bourke (Victorian sub-branch).

David Smith was re-elected as Queensland branch chair for 2020-21.

All IQA branch and sub-branch committee members will be listed on the IQA website after the conclusion of all branch AGMs.

WIQ QUEENSLAND CONFERENCE 2020

The IQA would like to thank the branch premium supporters for their ongoing support during this time: Astec Australia, Precisionscreen, Orica, Metso Outotec, Scope Engineering, Groundwork Plus and Komatsu Australia.

David Smith was re-elected as the branch chair and is supported by a strong committee. The branch is looking forward to resuming its full education and events program for 2020-21 to reconnect the industry and will be hosting the annual WIQ conference at the Glen Hotel, Eight Mile Plains on 19 November, 2020.

The New South Wales and Victorian branches and the Victorian sub-branch have all recently held successful virtual AGMs. The meetings were well attended, with the common theme that members are looking forward to getting together at future events. In 2020-21, the chairs of the three branches will be:

The IQA is proud to reschedule the WIQ Queensland Conference at the Glen Hotel, Eight Mile Plains, on 19 November,

IQA BRANCH CONTACTS

Past President John Stanton with Tasmanian Director of Mines Kevin Robinson at the Tasmanian branch’s AGM in September.

ACT

Melinda Merson: 0419 558 595

NSW

Melinda Merson: 0419 558 595

Northern

Melinda Merson: 0419 558 595

Hunter

Melinda Merson: 0419 558 595

Illawarra

Melinda Merson: 0419 558 595

Central West Melinda Merson: 0419 558 595

TASMANIA BRANCH AGM

Tasmania. This is a newly appointed role and the branch is very supportive of initiatives to support its young members.

There were presentations from two guest speakers: Tasmanian Director of Mines Kevin Robinson and Mineral Resources’ scientific manager Clint Siggins. The AGM also heard from the evening’s sponsor, industry training provider and IQA Tasmania training partner RTV Training, which outlined what State Government assistance is available to subsidise training and support industry.

QLD

Lisa Stromborg: 0403 291 996

Like the Queensland branch, members in Tasmania were delighted to be together face to face for the AGM and dinner meeting. The event, held in Launceston, was attended by 32 people. Ben Palmer will continue in the role as the branch chair, with all committee members continuing in their roles for 2020-21.

Nic Armstrong was appointed as the Young Member Network (YMN) co-ordinator for

North QLD

Lisa Stromborg: 0403 291 996

Cairns

Lisa Stromborg: 0403 291 996

48

Quarry October 2020

NT

SA

Lisa Stromborg: 0403 291 996

Marie Cunningham: 08 8243 2505

Tasmania

Lisa Stromborg: 0403 291 996

Victoria

Melinda Merson: 0419 558 595

Vic Sub-branch Melinda Merson: 0419 558 595 WA admin@quarry.com.au

The Institute of Quarrying Australia

MEMBERS SAVOUR OPPORTUNITY TO CATCH UP AND CONNECT AT BRANCH EVENTS It seems like a lifetime ago when the first restrictions and social distancing requirements were introduced. Since that time, we have all worked tirelessly to ensure our industry continued to operate during the pandemic and all those involved in the industry remained safe. Only time will tell where the pandemic ends. Countries around the world continue to report alarming numbers of new cases and sadly deaths. But as we see the numbers in Victoria drop, and restrictions ease, we can look forward to what might be in 2021 – an ability to once again connect in person.

Social belonging and connectivity is so important that it is recognised as a human need. Friendships play a critical role in how we connect and our overall happiness.

Recently the IQA successfully hosted face to face branch events in Tasmania and

2020. The theme – Untapped resources – recognises the diversity in industry, and the growing need to approach workforce development in different ways as businesses face a number of challenges when attracting and retaining talent.

Ever wonder about the future of our industry? How we keep up with changes in recycling and technology? You’ll find these answers and more at the conference. We’ll discuss the untapped resources in our industry – our minds, new technologies, or advancements in recycled products and environmental management.

Through the WIQ network, the IQA has successfully engaged hundreds of people to participate in networking/education events for the first time, provided leadership opportunities for people to be engaged as speakers and on committees for the first time, and profiled amazing career opportunities and leaders in the industry. We aim to build on this success and specifically address how to harness one of the industry’s untapped resources – people.

In 2020, thanks to COVID-19, the IQA, like

Queensland and will soon be running events in Western Australia and South Australia.

In planning these events there was resounding support from members who simply wanted to get together and see people in person and to reconnect with friends. The feedback is overwhelming that members are looking forward to the local events and catching up and connecting.

As we move through the period of annual general meetings, branches are confirming their committees for the next 12 months and looking at how they will adapt to this new world, but remain engaged with the industry.

While it’s a challenging time, it is also opening up changes and innovative ways of connecting.

many businesses has had to become agile and adaptable to cope with the changing landscape. This meant that work that was planned may have been adapted or put on hold until it is appropriate and safe to deliver.

Nonetheless, rest assured that the IQA will continue to work with the WIQ network to look at the overall diversity of the industry, encourage younger people to engage and look at ways of promoting the wonderful career paths within the industry as a whole.

For more information and to register, visit quarry.com.au

I’m looking forward to a number of events with increased enthusiasm for the sole reason of catching up. I will be speaking at the Women in Quarrying conference in Queensland on 19 November and I look forward to seeing everyone who can make it.

KYLIE FAHEY Chief Executive Officer Institute of Quarrying Australia

IQA NATIONAL AGM, 24 NOVEMBER, 2020 The IQA will be holding its first national AGM via Zoom. This is a great opportunity for members anywhere in Australia to attend the AGM. Papers, along with the 2020 Annual Report, will be issued to all financial members on 30 October, 2020.

IQA NEW MEMBERS

IQA EDUCATION

GRADE NAME

The workshops on Respirable Crystalline Silica are up and running. Training is focused on ensuring the industry understands the changes and the IQA is working closely with state regulators as the programs rollout. The NSW Resources Regulator participated in the first workshop in NSW on 17 September.

Associate Member Member Associate Associate Associate Associate Associate Member Associate Member

For further details on RCS training, effective risk management, introduction to safety management systems and more, visit quarry.com.au

BRANCH

Ryan Bates Kym Foster Cheryl Ward Nathan Parziani Aaron Muscat Martyn Gaunt Brady Talbot Carl Feilberg Luke Brammy Michelle Van Niekerk Mark Kersley

NSW SA VIC QLD QLD QLD NSW NSW SA QLD VIC

Quarry October 2020 49

GEOLOGY TALK

FROM QUARRIES TO WASTE FACILITIES

The Monash research team analysed about 19,000 abandoned mines and quarries in Victoria.

A map of abandoned Victorian mines and quarries, ranked from a low to high level of suitability for water supply storage.

A geospatial analysis of Victoria’s abandoned mines and quarries has identified several rehabilitation options.

A

study by Monash University researchers has investigated which of these sites can be repurposed for water storage, flood mitigation or municipal waste facilities.

Associate Professor Mohan Yellishetty, of the resources engineering division of the Department of Civil Engineering at Monash University, headed the seven-strong research team that undertook the study.

Yellishetty told Quarry that there are several other applications these sites can be used for, such as recycling.

“There are likely to be currently inactive mines for which recycling is a great option,” Yellishetty said. “It is a question of finding the right match between location, resources, capabilities, and market needs.

“If municipal waste recycling is the target, the proximity to a large population and transportation corridors to next use facilities are needed.

“A recently decommissioned mine may have materials handling and mobile equipment that could be repurposed very economically. A pit may be an ideal

50

Quarry October 2020

location to carry out activities where noise and dust abatement are required.”

The researchers used a Geographic Information System (GIS) to analyse the abandoned sites through a quantitative approach.

According to the researchers, the GIS was the most effective way to determine where the most suitable quarries and locations are for rehabilitation.

“With the ability to rapidly process different spatial maps and to calculate and evaluate the proximity of different abandoned mines to geographic, environmental, planning, demographic and other features, GIS analysis can produce ‘suitability maps’ that provide powerful visual aid and decision support to the diversity of stakeholders and community groups affected,” Yellishetty said.

This is important for scoping studies of quarries, where proximity is a significant factor.

“Quarry operators know more than most, it is not just a question of what you do, but where you do it,” Yellishetty said.

“A GIS study is an excellent way to commence a scoping study, whether it is to examine opportunities for a given operation, or the need to survey all possible sites in a region, state, or the whole country.

“The analysis can reveal the most suitable mines and locations for rehabilitation, contrast the difference in stakeholder opinions which are represented by different weightings of various factors influencing the decision process and quick map potential challenges and hazards that may arise in choosing specific areas over others.”

The study said that Victoria’s increasing population has caused an upsurge in the demand of waste management facilities, with abandoned quarries and mines also presenting a viable opportunity for more of these sites.

The full study – Rehabilitation opportunities – How Victoria can repurpose its abandoned mines - is available to view online at Monash LENS: lens.monash.edu/ @technology/2020/08/06/ 1380973/how-victoria-can-recycleits-abandoned-mines •

By Nickolas Zakharia

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