Risk
When Alejo Sfriso, corporate consultant at SRK Consulting Argentina, stepped up to the podium at the Life of Mine | Mine Waste and Tailings 2025 conference in Brisbane, his message was as direct as it was disruptive: it’s time to leave deterministic factor-of-safety thinking behind.
The future of underground mining could mean no one sets foot underground at all - a zero-entry mine powered by autonomy, interoperability, and constantly updated digital twins.
At the NSW Resources Regulator’s 33rd Mechanical Engineering Safety Seminar, Chief Inspector of Mines Anthony Margetts and Principal Inspector – Technical Russell Wood delivered a clear message: the industry must move beyond box-ticking and adopt smarter, outcomes-focused approaches to its most persistent hazards.
As mining companies increasingly operate from hundreds, sometimes thousands, of kilometres away from the pit or plant, one challenge has remained constant – how to give remote teams the same operational context, detail, and situational awareness they’d have if they were standing on site.
Every hour of downtime costs a mine tens of thousands of dollars, and Professor Amir Gandomi told the NSW Resources Regulator’s Mechanical Engineering Safety Seminar how artificial intelligence is now cutting those losses by predicting failures and optimising operations in seconds.
When reliable environmental performance data doesn’t exist, simulation can step in – and according to IGO Nova’s Zachary Hearne, it could give Australian producers a market advantage.
What do Formula 1 racing and tailings storage have in common? More than you’d think - especially when AI joins the engineering crew.
When global lenders assess mining projects, it is no longer enough to meet Australian legislation – financiers are demanding alignment with international ESG standards, and the gaps are costing companies time and money.
The future of Australia’s role in critical mineral supply chains may depend less on matching China’s scale and more on proving that secure, trusted supply with ESG credentials is worth paying for.
Contractor safety in Queensland’s coal sector isn’t just flawed—it’s dangerously broken, and one veteran risk expert is calling time on the whole system.
