Innovation and its role in improving ESG outcomes
Mining projects and operations are under constant pressure to deliver positive ESG outcomes. These requirements are set by a wide range of stakeholders, such as investors, local landowners, governments and broader communities.
Improving ESG outcomes continues to drive mining companies and engineers to seek new solutions and innovations to overcome operational challenges, which include reducing energy consumption, emissions, water consumption, footprint and producing safe and stable rehabilitated land from tailings and waste.
How to drive innovation
To drive innovation in an engineering business, the most important factor above all else is culture. All people within the organisation need to be motivated and supported to “find a better way”. As Phil Dakin, Ausenco’s Principal Layout Designer said recently, engineers and project developers need to ask “why” – and once they become proficient at asking and understanding “why” they need to ask “why not”, and leverage creativity and ingenuity to propose novel solutions.
The best questions are those that are asked across interfaces of role, discipline, scope or company. Questions asked across different knowledge areas will help grow understanding for both the person asking the question and the person answering it. A great question will often cause the whole project team to think at a higher level of detail and provoke ideas and new solutions.
When questions are asked across contract or scope interfaces, for example from a client to an engineer, or from an engineer to a vendor or constructor, all parties benefit from improved understanding and alignment. Recent work between Ausenco and an equipment supplier (in the form of iterative Q&A and thought-provoking discussions) has led to large simplifications in their equipment, and 30 – 40 per cent reduction in total installed cost, for the benefit of our project stakeholders.
Although asking questions is a simple concept, in practice there are many barriers to positive engagement and this style of thinking. For teams to be truly innovative, organisational hierarchies need to be as flat as possible, people need to be naturally inquisitive and strongly inspired, ideas need to be developed collaboratively, and the team needs to be open-minded to challenge and rebuild pre-existing conventions from fundamental principles. The whole project team, inclusive of clients, engineers and suppliers need to be fundamentally focussed on the objective of finding better ways for the project and all stakeholders.
Ideas versus innovation
Once a good idea is generated, the work has only just started. Most ideas never progress beyond the ‘concept’ phase, as they lack the pull-through to execution and a strong and clearly defined business case proposition. The decision to adopt a new innovation at an increased cost will always be met with resistance concerning return on the investment.
People at Ausenco are encouraged to consider innovation a little differently. Like all good engineering decisions, innovation must be approached with a clear focus on the business case. The benefits to all stakeholders must be quantified in some way and must clearly outweigh the costs or downsides. If this is done poorly, suboptimal decisions can lead to ‘local’ instead of ‘global’ optimisations, often undervaluing ESG benefits or underestimating ESG risks.
This is the difference between an idea and true innovation. It is this focus on holistic value that pulls innovation through the ‘innovation valley of death’ into highly applicable, sustainable and scalable solutions. It is also this approach that resonates with decision makers.
Ironically, net value is often a good proxy for a wide range of ESG metrics and generally promotes the right decision-making behaviours when properly assessed. For example, projects with reduced economic costs and reduced risks tend to also trend with reduced energy consumption, reduced carbon footprint, reduced water consumption and reduced footprint. If a value assessment is completed holistically inclusive of ESG factors, the project team can optimise the total project outcomes to the benefit of all stakeholders.
Overcoming future engineering challenges
The good news is that the technical outcomes are easy. As an industry, we already have proven approaches that can halve the energy, water and tailings footprint for major mining operations, delivering positive ESG and financial outcomes. The challenge is driving and growing acceptance of innovation across the wider industry to accelerate implementation.
It has been 10 years since Ausenco designed the first coarse particle flotation circuit which was successfully demonstrated in a hard rock copper-gold application at Cadia, and yet, it has only been implemented at three other hard rock operations since. Bulk ore sorting is operating successfully at scale. Novel tailings dewatering and management approaches have components which are industrially proven in isolation, but the pieces of the puzzle have not yet been holistically integrated. New innovations continue to be tested and proven, but implementation at scale within capital intensive mining operations is a complex exercise in people and change management that most businesses struggle to overcome.
It is important to therefore work with all stakeholders and mining companies to develop and apply the best industry understanding and capability, so that innovative solutions are not only technically viable, but practically demonstrable, successfully implemented and with confidence supported by a proven track record of delivering innovation.