Silvia Franca

Director

Centre for Mineral Technology

Keynote presentation: Challenges facing the mining industry in South America

Silvia França has been a member of CETEM's staff since 2002, where she has served as head of the New Mineral Products Development Service, Coordinator of Mineral Processes and internal member of the Center's Technical-Scientific Council.

Silvia has experience in RD&I projects in the mineral processing area, with an emphasis on solid-liquid separation operations, rheology of pulps and mineral tailings, dewatering, reuse of industrial water and application of new methods of disposal of tailings from the mining and metallurgical industry, among others.

As an international experience, she carried out an exchange program in the United States and, at the invitation of the International Atomic Energy Agency/UN, in Vienna-Austria, was part of a working group that debated issues related to monitoring the quality and uses of water in mining activities, consolidating document dealing with the matter. At the 8th World Water Forum, she also gave a lecture on the topic of water in mining.

She worked on the development of 35 technological products, with results presented at events abroad and in Brazil. She is one of the authors of a letter patent granted by INPI to CETEM on the process of concentrating zinc ore by reverse flotation.

She is one of the editors of the books Treatment of Minerals – 5th and 6th editions and Treatment of Ores - Laboratory Practices, both used as a text-base in Mining Engineering courses in Brazil, and is a Productivity Scholar in Technological Development and Innovative Extension (DT /CNPq) - Level 2.