“MATANO, TOWUTI, DAN MAHALONA”

AN APPRENTICESHIP EXPERIENCE AT PT VALE INDONESIA, TBK.,

Irma Magfirah 12119086

From June through August 2022, I was given an opportunity to have a taste first hand on the apprenticeship experience at one of the largest mining companies in Indonesia, i.e., PT Vale Indonesia, Tbk (PTVI) at Sorowako site to be precise. In terms of its accessibility, Sorowako can be accessed via land transport using a bus with Makassar-Sorowako route for ±12 hours. In fact, transportation access is available, despite its limited number and uncertain schedule as mentioned in its official website, PTVI has a concession area of 118,017 ha, divided into some areas in several provinces, namely Sorowako, Pomalaa, Suasua, and Bahodopi. The last time I left PTVI, the one actively producing was the Sorowako site. Meanwhile, other sites were still under development and trial mining processes. The commodity mined this company was nickel laterite with its processed final product being Nickel Matte (NiS) at an Ni level of 78%. For a mining student, having the firsthand experience in a company certainly gives some light into the mining practices in the field, particularly for my class who for the last two years lived their academic life online. I receive many benefits during my apprenticeship and it is expected that I can share them through this article. Despite its incompleteness, this article tries to summarize and divide it into some parts, i.e., regarding Vale and its priorities on environment and safety, the mining practices applied in PTVI, and a little bit expanding to the description of Sorowako as PTVI’s mining site as well as the place where the apprenticeship was carried out. I do hope this can inspire the readers and allow them to learn the lessons.

Vale and its priorities on environment and safety

One of what I was impressed with upon my apprenticeship in PTVI is the fact that mining can actually goes hand-to-hand with the environment! Using good mining practices, it is highly possible to reach this ideal. Per 2022, PTVI had received three Good Mining Practice Awards from the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources (ESDM). The land restoration practice was regularly carried out to the mined-out area. The compliance to meet the reclamation target has been one major factor for PTVI to receive award in environmental management. In addition, the commitment to support the sustainable development mission encouraged PTVI to invest more in constructing hydro power plant (PLTA). In 1979-2011 period, PTVI had constructed three hydro power plants at a total capacity of 365 MW that supplied 38% of PTVI’s energy consumption, partly for the processing plant and office’s electricity needs. Meanwhile, 10 MW was partly distributed to meet the electricity needs of its surrounding community. Thanks to the operation of these power plants, PTVI contributed to the reduction of carbon emission at 500 thousand tons of CO2 per year. As one of the companies producing one of the currently sought-after commodities, PTVI consistently applied the sustainable mining practices in encouraging the implementation of green economy through green mining.

PTVI not only has great concern on environmental carrying capacity, it also has high priority of work safety. One of the jargons frequently echoed there is “No Safety No Production”. A board containing the jargon can be found in many parts of the sites, and you can hear it any time. For nearly three months of apprenticeship, I heard the jargon nearly every day. The safety system is tightly applied there, starting from the obligation great lakes situated in Sorowako, making it highly possible to enjoy the natural views on the lake bank. If traveling further to neighboring villages is what you wish for, the Mata Buntu waterfall can be accessed for 20 minutes from Sorowako. One issue that students having apprenticeship there might find disadvantageous is the fairly high costs for accommodation. As normally the case of an area located near a large mine site, the costs for living there is relatively high, ranging from meal, to lodging, to other accommodations.

Mining Practices in PTVI

to use Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) upon the entrance to the site to real time monitoring through surveillance camera to ensure that everyone in the field has used PPE correctly. Worker’s safety is maintained not only when they are at work, but it is also ensured until they reach home by requiring them to use seat belt in the company’s bus. Every morning, workers responsible for the production will have a discussion as a form of Floor Management Developing System (FMDS), with one of the topics being the attempt to maintain and control work safety in the field. Other regulations are also tightly implemented in PTVI to ensure that workers are safe at work, however, it will take too much space to explain them one by one.

Sorowako, City of Mine

Sorowako has a total area of 480.27 km². As reflected by its fairly far access from the capital, Sorowako does not have the socalled “urban entertainment” such as mall, theaters, etc. On the contrary, various natural tourism entertainments can be enjoyed there. “Matano, Towuti, and Mahalona” that this article uses as its title are actually three

PTVI operates their mining using the side hill cut or open cut mining system. To plan a mining, mine plan engineers are divided into three, namely long-term, midterm and short-term planning engineers. At Sorowako site, selective mining is applied since the nickel ore mining is based on the requirement of ore specification that the plants can process. For this reason, sampling becomes the key to a successful mining. The sample to be tested is taken three times, namely before and during ore stripping and when the ores have been placed in the Run of Mine (ROM) and Wet Ore Storage (WOS). This makes the geology plays a critical role in nickel ore mining, especially in PTVI. The ores from the mining front are transported to ROM before being transported further to WOS. This is as far as the mines department is responsible. The ores from WOS are then processed in the plants and undergo a set of metallurgic processes before they can be sold to the market.

During my apprenticeship, I was with two other students from the mining engineering department of ITB, yet we had different topics. I was assigned with productivity topic, focusing on Queuing Theory in mining fleet. The flow of apprenticeship activities is orientation, data collection, data processing, and presentation. Orientation is where the topic is discussed together with the apprenticeship advisor and mining tour is carried out to get the general picture of mining in PTVI. For data collection, the cycle times of transport and excavation equipment are directly observed in the field. During this stage, I learned a lot of lessons on the mining apprenticeship I could previously only enjoyed through books or videos. One of these lessons was the double-side loading process as can be seen in figure below which surprisingly could provide a considerable cycle time discount to make the production time more efficient. Finally, the data processing and presentation were mostly carried out in the office. ticeship”. Apprenticeship gives students first-hand practical experience in the field in a relatively not too short period of time, allowing them to capture the big picture of real mining process. Surely theories and real practices in the field will have many differences.

Thus, the apprenticeship procession serves as the right momentum for students to intensify their knowledge and learn as many lessons as possible!

Mister Budi, a lecturer at Mining Engineering Education Program of ITB once said “Students becomes smart after appren-