Worker welfare a major focus

Austmine 2021 celebrated the latest technologies and innovations.

Worker welfare a focus for mining leaders

IN WHAT IS BELIEVED TO BE THE FIRST MAJOR MINING CONFERENCE SINCE THE BEGINNING OF COVID-19, THE AUSTMINE 2021 CONFERENCE & EXHIBITION HAS BROUGHT MINING AND INDUSTRY DELEGATES TOGETHER TO DISCUSS INNOVATION AND SAFETY.

Adiverse workforce and industry collaboration are increasingly being emphasised by industry leaders as essential parts of improving safety in the mining and resources industry.

This year’s Austmine 2021 Conference featured a focus on workforce safety and welfare, especially emphasising the importance of innovation to improve technology and improve safety on site.

Whether it is a move towards autonomy to enable workers to work from home, or a focus on artificial intelligence (AI) to keep miners out of the line of fire, safety has become a major issue for companies involved in the mining and resources sector.

Workforce diversity, collaboration and technology advances have been identified as important steps in ensuring safety remains a key to the mining and resources industry.

BHP group health safety and environment officer Rob Telford says the company has not had a fatality at its operations for more than two years.

“That was a milestone that we didn’t meet with celebration but more with sombre reflection that we were doing something right,” Telford says.

“Safety has been at the core of us for a very long time. We measure and monitor all incidents as they happen in real time and we use that data to assess how we can prevent any possible incidents.”

BHP’s Western Australian iron ore South Flank maintenance manager Lorraine Sabbouh says the company has worked to get frontline information from its machines in the field.

“We looked really hard to find something that could do that in the marketplace and we couldn’t find anything that would tick all the boxes,” she says.

“So we went from a whiteboard to a red-box prototype in about six weeks. It then took us about eight weeks to get the red-box prototype onto our equipment at South Flank.

“That allowed our workers to get that data into their hands remotely.

Komatsu senior mining engineer Melinda Court says the OEM’s Tune Safe technology is enabling the company to collect data remotely.

“Tune safe allows our workers to safely collect raw data from the work site remotely and allows us to use that data to maximise safety in the workplace,” Court says.

“This way we can protect our workers while maximising our output and collecting the relevant data.”

Data analysis has become a focus for industry leaders, as it allows a greater depth of research into best mining practices, as well as health and safety regulations.

As one of the most successful organisations in the resources sphere, BHP has moved towards a greater focus on autonomy and an off-site workforce.

BHP Western Australian Iron Ore (WAIO) asset president Brandon Craig says the major miner aims to run a safe iron ore business through a focus on workforce diversity.

He says a diverse workforce is critical to the advancement of innovation in the workplace.

“We also believe that a diverse culture sits at the centre of a safe and highly productive workplace,” Craig says.

“That’s critically important, because the analysis we’ve done shows that our more diverse teams have substantially less injuries, are more willing to speak up on safety, are more likely to follow safe work practices and are more likely to adhere to planned maintenance work.”

According to BHP analysis, a diverse workforce also rates their job and their leader more favourably and are more likely to meet their production plans.

Craig says to continue this trend there is a need to redesign work to make it more accessible to everyone.

BHP’s Dash Maintainer Tools won the Austmine Innovation for Miners award, with Anglo American Digitisation of Work Orders and BHP’s TROC Human Machine Interface recognised as finalists.

Dash Maintainer Tools is a hardware and software platform which allows maintenance technicians to undertake diagnostic testing tasks on mobile mining equipment without being within the footprint of the machine, removing them from the line of fire.

“Engineering, technology, innovation and creative thinking will give rise to an industry that will look different, feel different and operate differently. But a far better industry to work in, one that is fundamentally safer, more dynamic, more creative and better connected,” Craig explains.

“Our Fatality Elimination Program, launched last year with Austmine, is part of a bigger global focus we have on permanently eliminating fatalities across our operations.

“Across industry we have seen

Lynas Rare Earths managing director Amanda Lacaze highlights the importance of on-site safety.

Austmine is believed to be one of the largest gatherings of the industry since COVID-19 began.

BHP WA Iron Ore asset president Brandon Craig says innovation is the key to a safe workplace.

significant improvements in safety performance as we have deployed greater levels of process automation.

“This has typically taken the form of automating industrial processes and more recently load-and-haul fleets across mining operations. In this way, our operational processes have become intrinsically safer, year on year.”

Maptek founder Bob Johnson, who received the Austmine Champion of Innovation award, says the Austmine conference has welcomed innovation in the industry since its inception.

“Under the chairmanship of Eric Garner, we shared a vision of our collective strength … and the power of this team approach to the delivery of mining services has clearly been established by the sheer size of the Austmine membership today,” Johnson says.

“Today, Austmine members are the right hand of the mining industry, pioneering change and ever improving the efficiency and safety in mines around the world.

“We did not envisage some of these great outcomes. That is exactly what happens when you make that extra effort.”

Lynas Rare Earths managing director Amanda Lacaze says getting workers home safely is the most important thing a mining company can do, especially in the current COVID-19 climate.

Like many organisations in the mining industry, Lynas works across multiple jurisdictions, meaning its approach to safety across these regions has to be the same and different.

“It has to be the same because human bodies are broken in the same way all over the world. It has to be different because people live in different cultures and have different approaches to risk,” Lacaze says.

Lacaze says dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic has altered the way companies run their business, including Lynas.

The company’s COVID-19 response team in Malaysia, for example, has needed to innovate every day in new ways to keep its people safe in this environment.

“Today we have significant testing done before anyone is allowed on site,” Lacaze says.

“It is vital that we continue to look after the welfare of our workers and their families to grow as an industry.”

BHP WAIO’s Craig says improvements in mining technology and a focus on the safety and wellbeing of the workforce will have a huge impact on the industry.

“Imagine the results, across industry, if we all focused on the goal of eliminating live energy and high-risk work from mining equipment, and what this could do for eliminating the risk of fatalities in our industry and pushing our productivity envelopes harder,” Craig says.

“None of us here in this room want to see fatalities occurring in our industry. This is a shared goal we can all work towards, and one that is truly meaningful.”

Tech talks allowed companies the chance to explain their latest innovations.