Codelco’s Corporate Innovation and Technology Department and SMI-ICE-Chile have signed an important strategic alliance that enables the joint search for innovative solutions in the areas of circular economy, climate change, biodiversity conservation, water management and mining-metallurgical processes.
“This agreement is the next step in the collaboration initiated with the University of Queensland to promote more sustainable and environmentally responsible mining,” says Gabriel Méndez, Vice President of Corporate Affairs and Sustainability at Codelco. “Today we are taking it to an operational level, in the generation of concrete projects that, I am sure, will have a positive impact on our operations. Milestones like this are what bring us closer to realizing our purpose of being a pillar of sustainable development in Chile and the world.”
For his part, Doug Aitken, executive director of SMI-ICE-Chile, also highlighted the importance of this alliance: “We have to rethink how we are doing mining, and this agreement will allow us to generate new solutions for the multiple challenges we face,” he said. “Our center has experts working in each area in which we will collaborate, and we must take advantage of that capacity to find innovative, interdisciplinary and highly valuable responses for Codelco and for Chile.”
This agreement also incorporates the existing know-how and technological development at the Sustainable Minerals Institute of The University of Queensland. For example, in the field of circular economy, there is the OreSands Program, focused on reducing the generation of tailings by recovering the silicate fraction of the mineral, used to produce construction materials for local markets; as well as the contribution of MIWATCH, -Mining Waste Transformation Trough Characterisation- a research group of the Sustainable Minerals Institute of the University of Queensland that focuses on the characterization of mining waste to identify and recover valuable elements; and also the work of a research group focused on analyzing environmental, social, technical and economic impacts in the metal value chain, with the aim of recovering value from mining waste and metals from end-of-life products.
In terms of climate change, it covers topics such as: Modelling and mapping of climate change impacts: research on the evaluation of future scenarios for the mining industry in Chile; modelling of climate scenarios in the Andes; research and analysis of the impact of precipitation on water availability; research on climate risks in mine closure; and research associated with the development of tools and strategies to mitigate the impacts of climate change in arid mining areas.
In terms of environmental rehabilitation and conservation, Development and Innovation (“R&D&I”) projects are contemplated to restore ecosystems and conserve biodiversity.
And in the field of innovation and technology in extractive metallurgy and mining processes, the preparation and execution of technological programs that incorporate new technological trends and cutting-edge processes is specified; the realization of studies, process modeling, phenomenological simulation, development of tools and mathematical models and advanced analytics, for the better understanding, optimization and incremental and/or disruptive improvement of concentration, smelting, leaching processes and in general of mining-metallurgical processes.
Read the official statement from Codelco
