Final Calls for Abstracts for Biohydromet '18 and Sustainable Minerals '18

Namibia is one of the great African countries (posting of 26 April 2014) and its capital, Windhoek, will be the venue for MEI's two back to back conferences in June next year, Biohydrometallurgy '18 and Sustainable Minerals '18. Both conferences are in association with the newly formed Namibia University of Science and Technology, and will be held at the very impressive Windhoek Country Club Resort.

Fransfontein Mountains, Namibia

Biohydromet '18 is MEI's 9th conference in this series, previous events being held in Cape Town and Falmouth. The meeting will cover the latest developments in the field of biohydrometallurgy: the development, optimisation and application of integrated biomining process operations for mineral ores, including low grade and complex ores; the microbiology of biomining and the application of biohydrometallurgy to novel resources (such as mine and electronic wastes) and the bioremediation of mining-impacted environments.

The keynote lecture will be given by Prof. Sue Harrison, of the University of Cape Town, who will discuss the role of biohydrometallurgy in the sustainable development of mineral resources (posting of 10 July), and appropriately the conference sponsor is Outotec, who last year was ranked for the second time as the world's third most sustainable company and in 2015 strengthened its portfolio of gold processing technologies by acquiring Biomin's BIOX® bioleaching technology.

Outotec is also one of the sponsors of Sustainable Minerals '18, the 5th in the series,  which immediately follow Biohydromet 18. Zeiss is also a major sponsor, and CEEC an industry advocate. This is a particularly topical conference as the rapid growth of the world economy is straining the sustainable use of the Earth’s natural resources due to modern society’s extensive use of metals, materials and products. An astute and conscious application and use of metals, materials and products supported by the reuse and recycling of these materials and end-of-life products is imperative to the preservation of the Earth’s resources. The realisation of the ambitions of sustainable use of metals, materials and resources demands that the different disciplines of the material and consumer product system are connected and harmonised.

In a keynote lecture, Prof. Rob Dunne will provide an overview of water in the wider global arena and compare this to how the mining industry has dealt with water stewardship over the last couple of decades, and what the future may hold (posting of 24th April).

In the second keynote lecture Prof. Yiannis Pontikes, of KU Leuven, Belgium will introduce a process where Fe-rich residues, produced in many hydro and pyro metallurgical processes, can be used as raw material in the synthesis of inorganic polymers (posting of 22nd January). These materials show properties comparable to Portland cement while having a smaller environmental footprint.

We invite you to join us in Namibia next June. If you would like to present a paper, short abstracts should be submitted by the end of December. As with all MEI Conferences, the papers will be peer-reviewed for consideration for publication in special issues of Minerals Engineering.

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