WESTERN Australia’s reputation as a world leader in mining-related research continues to grow despite the ongoing effects of last year’s global economic slowdown.
WESTERN Australia’s reputation as a world leader in mining-related research continues to grow despite the ongoing effects of last year’s global economic slowdown.
Research is generally the first area to suffer when companies are forced to tighten their belts to navigate their way through the sort of crunch that struck last year.
But as the Bentley-based Parker Centre has proved over the last 17 years, when that research delivers benefits worth hundreds of millions of dollars, industry knows it cannot afford to lose momentum.
A collaborative joint venture between academia, government and industry, the centre was established in 1992 under the federal government’s Cooperative Research Centres Program and specialises in hydrometallurgical processing research for miners.
Its core public sector participants comprise the CSIRO, Curtin University, Murdoch University, and the University of Queensland, supported by a score of mining and refining companies and industry groups such as Alcoa, BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto, the Minerals Council of Australia and WA Department of Mines and Petroleum.
The primary focus of the centre’s research programs has been on delivering significant processing advances for the alumina, gold and base metals sectors.
A recent review by external consultants RMDSTEM estimated that the centre has generated a staggering $550 million in net benefits for the industry since its inception.
Even more amazingly, the review found that the centre delivered a net return of $22 on every dollar invested in it by industry between 2005 and 2008.
Little wonder, then, that 2008-09 was a record year for the centre in terms of direct financial support from industry, with 104 companies together providing $6.7 million in funding for specific commercial research initiatives. That was more than $1.3 million better than the record achieved in the preceding year.
Based on the study findings, last year’s research alone should ultimately deliver almost $150 million in net benefits.
That excludes the benefits flowing from the $3 million in annual CRC funding provided by the Commonwealth and $300,000 put in by the Western Australian government each year. This government funding is earmarked for pre-competitive research into so-called breakthrough technologies with the potential to overcome industry-wide technical obstacles.
Such initiatives include research to improve alumina yield of silica-rich bauxite, bioleaching low-grade chalcopyrite copper ores, and preventing iron oxide contamination during nickel and zinc production.
According to centre chief executive Steve Rogers, the centre expects to almost match last year’s funding record during the 2010 financial year.
“My reading is that unless there is a huge dip, we are going to be up there around $6 million again in the current financial year,” Dr Rogers said.
He said that reflected the quality of the centre’s research and heightened industry interest in efficiency gains amid tougher market conditions. While research cost money, companies recognised the value created by the centre’s work.
“That is absolutely the case – at the end of the day, the reason we’re still here is that we enable them (industry) to maintain their competitive advantage,” Dr Rogers told WA Business News.
A key to the centre’s success has been that advisory panels of industry and government representatives work together to identify what the highest risk pre-competitive research should focus on. Importantly, the benefits of that pre-competitive research then become available to the industry as a whole.
Dr Rogers said that collaborative approach to knowledge transfer had resulted in the centre becoming recognised as probably the world’s leading hydrometallurgy research organisation.
As a “repository for expertise, knowledge and skills”, he said the centre enabled industry to effectively outsource vital research at a time when fewer companies had the resources to individually undertake high level research.
While ongoing research into alumina, base metals and gold processing remains the centre’s biggest focus, it has also now begun research on uranium hydrometallurgy reflecting the upsurge in activity in the sector, especially in WA.
In particular, the work has focused on ways to effectively heap leach the low-grade style of uranium deposits typical in this state
Primarily funded by smaller explorers, Dr Rogers said he expected uranium research to represent a rapidly growing portion of the centre’s activities.
However, the centre is facing a significant challenge in determining its long-term future.
The centre may only apply for one more five-year period of federal funding, starting in mid 2012, after which it must exit the CRC program.
While it is currently engaging with industry to shape its final CRC funding submission, due in mid 2011, Dr Rogers said it was also planning for life after the CRC.
That was likely to include seeking direct industry and state government support for pre-competitive research currently funded by the Commonwealth.
