Christchurch - 2025 Visiting Lecturer Tour: Repurposing mines post-closure

Professor David Williams, recently retired from The University of Queensland, has over 45 years of teaching, research and consulting experience. He is internationally recognised for his expertise and experience in mine waste management and mine closure, particularly tailings dams. He was a member of the 2019 Brumadinho Failure Expert Panel. He initiated and largely delivers the highly successful AusIMM Professional Certificate Course in Tailings Management.

Professor Williams was a member of an Expert Panel investigating technical causes of the Brumadinho tailings dam failure and is on a number of Tailings Independent Technical Review Boards, including for Escondida.

He authored the 2009 and 2016 Tailings Management Handbook, as part of the Commonwealth Leading Practice Sustainable Development Program for the Mining Industry. Professor Williams is currently involved in the Working Party for the Australian National Committee for Large Dams Guidelines on Tailings Dams – Planning, Design, Construction, Operation and Closure, published in 2012, with an update in 2019.