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Is mining engineering still an option for aspiring students?
ACHIEVING EXCELLENCE IN POSTGRADUATE RESEARCH
During the graduation ceremony of 2020, two of the Department’s master’s degree students received their degrees cum laude. Both are working mining engineers who conducted research in topics that will be of benefit to the mining engineering industry.
Michael Neale
Jaco Mans
The objective of Michael Neale’s master’s degree research was to improve the usability of mine design software to alleviate several existing concerns in the mining industry. Software developers should ideally be equipped with usability guidelines relevant to mine design software. However, there is virtually no literature that applies software usability concepts to mining or related domains, and other work in this field may not be transferable to the mining industry. This means that attempts to improve mine design software usability would either be unguided or at risk of using inappropriate guidelines.
A systematic literature review of mine design software formed the basis of his research on mine design software usability requirements. The review considered 128 recent publications, of which 24 were selected for further analysis. Information was extracted from each selected source based on the usability components as relayed by ISO 9241-11. Thematic analyses were performed within the components, and all but the weakest themes were interpreted as mine design software usability requirements.
The identified mine design software usability requirements were applied to an undisclosed mining material flow modelling software package, which showed that the requirements can be effective in identifying usability gaps and guiding improvements.
The main use of the guidelines is to direct further usability work such as gap analyses, interviews, surveys and usability testing. The requirements produced can also be used to introduce newcomers to the nature of mine design work.
According to Neale, further work is required to validate the requirements from other sources. This includes expanded literature searches and non-literature sources such as workshops, interviews, surveys and support calls. The potential value-add and ease of application of the requirements should also be tested, especially in comparison with standard usability tools. The master’s degree study of Jaco Mans involved a critical investigation into design guidelines relating to mine design project management. His dissertation took the form of a prototype activity blueprint that references the detailed activities required for the various disciplines involved in a mine design study or project for each of four phases defined in the activity blueprint process.
In his research, Mans combined detailed technical checklists from other studies and projects with international codes to obtain a collective checklist that includes all the technical disciplines involved. Together, these items must meet the minimum criteria for the level of study required, while also incorporating some project management, risk management and activity blueprintspecific principles to be followed during a study or project.
The resulting activity-based blueprint would include project management principles and processes to guide project control within the financial and timeline budget. These detailed activities were garnered from all the common and less common areas of influence on a mine design study or project so that no item was left unattended. The outcome was a disciplined process, which prompted the user to consider each activity, but which allowed enough freedom to break each activity down into more relevant detail depending on the natural progression of the study or project.
The study took a holistic approach, and involved activities that were fairly straightforward and could continue irrespective of the next decision to be taken, and without risk to prevent any potential project delays or long lead times because of manufacturing. As a result, the project could continue at a steady pace.
According to Mans, this activity blueprint document covered the minimum detail to define the project to a certain maturity phase in the industry. While remaining compliant, it did not become too descriptive to allow each project to be unique.
Why study postgraduate?
The Department places great emphasis on a postgraduate qualification to ensure the sustainability of the industry. Its enrolment strategy aims to have 30% full-time postgraduates active in research in the Department at any time. According to Prof Ronny Webber-Youngman, the generation of new knowledge, which is vital for a sustainable mining environment, can only occur though quality research and the subsequent inclusion of that new knowledge in the Department’s undergraduate and postgraduate programmes, as well as its short courses for industry. This view is supported by Prof Francois Malan, who believes that postgraduate programmes should emphasise innovative thinking.
In the view of Jannie Maritz, the Department’s Teaching and Learning Function Head, bringing together fundamental research and practical implementation in postgraduate research facilitates the complex problemsolving skills that are needed to drive change in future mining operations. “A better understanding of the problem will lead to better solutions,” he explains.
Postgraduate students in the Department also have a clear view of the value of a postgraduate qualification from the University of Pretoria. They have expressed that postgraduate studies provide the opportunity for students to explore specialised fields such as rock engineering and ventilation, which are essential and scarce skills in the South African mining industry.
Driven by innovation, researchers contribute to solving mining’s toughest challenges and thereby push the industry forward into a new era of depth and productivity.
Undertaking research with real-life implications
South Africans are working towards a future where all citizens are equal and prosperous. The vast mineral wealth of the country is a vehicle for financial and societal liberation. Mining companies are therefore responsible for huge networks of economic activities.
With improved technology and mining methods, these networks can be expanded to eradicate poverty, unemployment and inequality. Prof Webber-Youngman believes that research related to eradicating these three societal ills will not only benefit the mining industry, but society at large. A cornerstone to this is the training of excellent mining engineers. As the mining industry is such a large employer of human resources, it has a responsibility towards its communities in terms of both the social licence to operate and ensuring that the environment surrounding mines is both healthy and safe.
By valuing not only the investing stakeholder, but also the people involved in mining, a reimagined mining industry, supported by relevant research, can enable a better workforce and create a more sustainable industry and a healthier community. The mining landscape is constantly changing with a larger demand for social and environmental considerations. These are core elements of the Department’s research interventions.
An outcome of growing the mining industry through relevant and resilient research is an increase in the country’s GDP, with an accompanying reduction in the unemployment rate and the establishment of associated industries. The Department therefore has a responsibility to produce more socially minded young mining engineers who can promote this change.
Research that is focused on improving the sustainability of the industry by improving productivity and the optimisation of mines will also benefit the communities that are reliant on the longevity of the mine. In addition to being focused on the social impacts of mining, research is conducted into the future of mining, the role of technology and methods to improve operations to make them more efficient and safer, ultimately building healthier, more resilient communities.
According to Prof Malan, the closure of older mines with only a few new mines being commissioned has a large impact on the sustainability of the industry. The subsequent loss of employment is devastating to communities. South Africa is unique in the sense that many of its ore bodies are tabular and much innovation and research is required to mine them. Many older mines have significant resources left in their stabilising pillars, and an important research area is determining how these resources can be mined safely and profitably to prolong the life of many of these mines.
While the Department’s research into rock engineering is exploring the future of smaller and more effective pillars in the hard rock environment, research into flyrock and stemming are improving the science and practice of blasting into a new era of safety and performance. Research into leadership and technology are also redefining how leadership and technology are being used in large mining houses.
Other future prospects for mining include breaking the enigma of rock stresses and expensive cooling for deeper mines, ocean mining (underwater mining), automation and the modernisation of mining, and mechanised rock-breaking.
