Delivering Solutions for Sustainable Mining in Solomon Iron Ore Project through SUSOP®

Responsible and prudent use of natural resources has been identified as one of the most challenging globalissues, which makes using sustainability principles in mining an increasingly popular topic. Mining operationsare generally associated with a range of environmental and social impacts negatively affecting localcommunities. There is a growing importance to better understand the environmental, social, and commercialfactors that affect the development of new resources projects. Although innovative resource conservation inmining projects satisfies the aims of corporate sustainability principles, such capabilities are often bypassed infavour of tried and tested solutions that are recognized to have lower technical and financial risks. This is, inpart, a result of a lack of an appropriate methodical and strict framework in project management systems thatallows sustainability to be properly considered, analysed, and assessed in projects. While there are a number oftools and methodologies that incorporate sustainability in design, only rarely can one find a consistent,integrated, and robust method to support mineral projects by incorporating a high level of sustainabilityprinciple into the design process. In an attempt to resolve this issue, a research team has developed theSustainable Operations framework, SUSOP®. SUSOP® is an integrated and robust framework for projectmanagement system through which the sustainability concept can be applied effectively without compromisingfinancial rigor. To demonstrate the robustness of this framework and investigate the opportunities or risks thatcould emerge from applying the SUSOP® framework, a case study on the Fortescue Metals Group SolomonIron Ore Mine Project was conducted. This case study was chosen after investigation of numerous cases allaround Australia. This case study applies the SUSOP® framework retrospectively for integrating sustainabilityconcepts into Solomon Project in design, construction, and operation phases without workshop element. Theframework is applied to identify innovative opportunities and uncover additional risks that do not appear to havebeen identified or mentioned in the public domain and data have been applied on the project