Agenda

CONFERENCE DAY ONE
Monday 28 June 2010

DAY ONE | DAY TWO

8.30 Registration and coffee

9.00 Welcome from the chair

MINE DEVELOPMENT AND PRODUCTION

9.10 Assessing ground conditions, deformation and support at Argyle block cave project
Fernando Fernandez, Argyle Underground Project, Rio Tinto

9.50 Developments in ground support and strata control Examining the latest technologies for strata control:

• Background
• Current ground support technologies3
• Natural e.g. room and pillar, rib billars, barrier pillars, crown pillars
• Artificial:
  (a) Rock reinforcement e.g. bolts - rebar bolts and their derivatives - cable bolts; grouted rock bolts; mechanical anchors; resin - anchors; split-sets; swellex
  (b) Surface support e.g. strapping; steel beams; arches; concrete sprays - shotcrete, stratacrete, aquacrete
  (c) Mechanised hydraulic chocks
• Temporary and rapidly responsive ground support
• Measuring and modelling ground behaviour and roof support behaviour
• Controlling ground support costs e.g. initial costs; rehabilitation costs e.g. corrosion effected ground support; early integrity testing/detection technologies

Wouter Hartmann, Principal Geotechnical Engineer and Director, Geohart Consultants Pty Ltd

10.30 Morning refreshments and networking break

11.00 Underground mine ventilation - Managing the air down there

• Estimating primary airflow requirements
• Elements of ventilation design
• Understanding legislative requirements
• Particulate monitoring and dust management
• Measuring and minimising diesel particulate matter
• Promoting performance of underground ventilation control devices (VCDs)
• Predicting responses of VCDs to blast dynamics
• Heat management - opting between cooling and airway development
• Developing a fire protection strategy

Dr Rick Brake, Principal, Mine Ventilation Australia

11.30 Building "rock factories" - exploring developments in block caving

• Planning and designing block caving
• Advances in caving technology
• Rock deformation mechanisms, preconditioning and other geomechanical considerations
• Materials handling issues faced in the high production environment
• Safety issues faced in developing and managing block caving operations
• Managing sublevel caving and avoiding unwanted subsidence

12.10 Luncheon

ESTABLISHING UNDERGROUND PROJECTS

1.10 Strategic approaches to underground mine planning

• Deriving practicality from feasibility studies
• Examining mine development strategies
• Managing the transition from feasibility to execution plan
• Ensuring compliance to plan: long term to short term

Ken Larwood, Senior Consulting Engineer, Mining Plus Pty Ltd

1.50 Optimising the design of underground mines

• Moving from mine concept to design implementation
• Designing stopes, stope access, haulage methods and developing schedules
• for maximum value
• Dealing with challenges such as gradient and turning circle restrictions
• in decline design
• Using software packages utilising mathematical network theory in
• efficient mine design
• Ventilation, geotechnical constraints and risk management

Professor J Hyam Rubenstein, Mechanical Engineering, University of Melbourne

2.30 Afternoon refreshments and networking break

3.00 Cut-off grade optimisation in underground mining systems

• Optimising underground compared to pits
• Designing underground stopes to the marginal cut-off grade
• Increasing NPV by raising the cut-off grade
• Maximising NPV by adopting a dynamic cut-off grade policy for underground mining systems

Gerald Whittle, Managing Director, Whittle Consulting Pty Ltd

3.40 The future of hoists and belt conveyors in underground mass mining operations

Designers of future underground mass mining operations are faced with a choice between hoisting and belt conveying systems or a combination of these systems as multiple flights and multiple streams. Hoisting systems are limited in the lift of each flight by the strength and weight properties of the ropes and are limited in the production of each stream by practical limits on the maximum hoisting speed. Belt conveying systems are similarly limited in the lift of each flight by the strength and weight properties of the belt and are limited in the production of each stream by practical limits on the belt speed. This presentation explores the limits of application of hoisting and belt conveying systems for future underground mass mining operations

John Spreadborough, National Technical Executive Materials Handling, Parsons Brinckerhoff

4.20 End of Day One

UnderMINE Networking Drinks

CONFERENCE DAY TWO
Tuesday 29 June 2010

DAY ONE | DAY TWO

8.30 Registration and coffee

9.00 Opening remarks from the chair

INNOVATION IN UNDERGROUND MINING

9.10 Overcoming barriers to innovation in underground mining

• Balancing the risks of innovation against benefits
• Creating innovation partnerships in industry - breaking through the "first to be second" mentality in technology adoption
• Examining the range of major technological advances to mining and future directions
• Cultural barriers to innovation - selling the case for technology upgrades to senior management

Jock Cunningham, Theme Leader, Transforming the Future Mine, Minerals Down Under National Research Flagship, CSIRO

9.50 Bridging the automation skills gap
Exploring why the Australian resource sector should support an automation skills development program
Derek Hunter, Chief Executive Officer, Mining Industry Skills Centre

10.30 Morning refreshments and networking break

SAFETY AND COMPLIANCE

11.00 Panel Discussion:
Mine inspections in the underground arena - What do regulators expect?

• Examining key compliance requirements and where underground mine sites typically fall down
• Developing a holistic compliance plan
• Understanding modern mine inspection techniques - surveying and data collection
• Ensuring accessibility and promoting due diligence
• Life post-prohibition notice - dealing with the aftermath of non-compliance

Simon Ridge, Director Mines Safety, State Mining Engineer, Department Of Mines and Petroleum, WA
Johan Booyse, Snr. Advisor, Hazards - Extractives, Department of Labour, New Zealand

11.50 Challenges faced in contractor alliance management

• Examining contractor/mine owner dynamics
• Creating long range sustainable alliances
• Establishing clear guidelines and key performance indicators in your contract agreement
• Taking a holistic approach to staff training and upskilling
• Performance management in a heterogenous workforce
• Overcoming a lack of commitment
• Promoting a synchronised mine - building a "one team" mentality

Rick Carter, Site Business Manager, Newmont Waihi Gold, Newmont Asia Pacific

12.30 Luncheon

1.30 The couch and the longwall - The marriage between psychology and safety in the mining industry

As safety professionals and leaders within industry understand, the safety performance of any business is the result of a complex interaction between organisational and individual factors. With the almost inevitable plateau that many organisations are now experiencing, further improvements necessitate 'doing something different', rather than simply more of the same. To do this, we need to apply good psychology and neuroscience to leadership within the safety domain. Using an applied approach based in real industry examples, this session will:

• Use a simple functional model of the brain to understand core drivers of human behaviour as they apply to leading effective safety behaviours
• Explore the relatively predictable 'stages of change' as the framework to understand resistance to change and how to ensure true change that will be sustained over the long term
• Offer practical and simple strategies to implement these new understandings

Dr Ali Dale, Principal Psychologist, Sentis

2.10 Site tour and post-summit drinks
Examining Northbridge Central Institute of Technology's CUT simulator

The CUT is a simulated mine, designed to give students of Central's Certificate III in Mining a realistic feel for the underground work environment. Developed in collaboration with a set design company, it has walls mimicking rock faces containing copper, gold and nickel. The ‘mine’ also includes a refuge chamber donated by MineARC. This session will look at the impact of this training environment on educational outcomes for green recruits to underground mining, followed by post-summit refreshments.

Charles Dornan, Lecturer, Mining and Geoscience, Central Institute of Technology

3.30 End of Conference

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