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Thursday 21st July – 4pm AEDT
Online
04.00PM – Daniel Muggleton – Stand-up Comic
04.10PM – Anita Parbhakar-Fox – No more (mine) wasted opportunities? Australia in 2022
04.50PM – Happy Hour – Q&A + Networking
Anita Parbhakar-Fox, Sustainable Minerals Institute
Anita is the Group Leader of the new ‘Mine Waste Transformation through Characterisation’ team at the W.H. Bryan Mining and Geology Research Centre- part of the Sustainable Minerals Institute. Anita’s research is focussed on mine waste characterisation to improve mine planning and waste management practices where she has worked with mining industry, METS sector and government stakeholders. She has developed new tests and protocols for improving waste characterisation and is also involved in identifying remediation options for abandoned/ historical mine sites. Most recently, Anita has led government and industry funded projects characterising a range of mine waste materials to evaluate their economic potential.
To go green, the world will need vast quantities of critical minerals such as manganese, lithium, cobalt and rare earth elements. But to some environmentalists, mining to save the planet is a hard pill to swallow if it leads to damage to pristine areas.
The good news is that in many cases, the mining for these minerals has already been done. After Australia’s major miners dig up iron ore, billions of tonnes of earth and rock are left over. Hidden in these rock piles and tailing dams are minerals vital to high tech industries of today and tomorrow.
In recent years, we have seen a welcome focus on remining – the extraction of valuable minerals and metals from mining waste. While Australia has been slow to adopt this approach, it holds real promise. We don’t necessarily have to mine more. We can mine smarter.
