Great news for Starkey & Associates

Interesting to hear recently (MEI Online) of an alliance between two Canadian companies. Starkey & Associates Inc. is well known in the minerals industry, being a world leader in SAG mill design. Sacré-Davey Engineering is perhaps not so well known, the company having a high profile in mine design.

Sacré-Davey has announced the expansion of its engineering and project management services by joining forces with Starkey & Associates, the Sacré-Davey team from Toronto moving to the Starkey & Associates Offices in Oakville, with John Starkey heading the office group as Chief Metallurgist for Sacré-Davey Engineering. John says "I am excited about this agreement because it brings into play all of my previous engineering and operating experience and allows the mill design development work, which I recently completed, to be implemented directly into new process plants, bringing great value to Starkey and Sacré-Davey clients".

Over recent years John Starkey and his wife Donna have become great friends of the MEI family, and we meet up roughly once a year, at MEI's comminution conferences in Cape Town, and at the SME Meetings in Denver. 

Barbara with Donna and John Starkey

John will be 82 years old this month, and has often spoken about the possibility of retirement (or at least Donna has), but I have always been sceptical. He is passionate about what he does, and has obvious immense pride in his company, which is very highly regarded in the minerals industry. I would think that, with this latest exciting venture, his plans for retirement will be kept on hold for the foreseeable future, and I am sure that we will continue to see John and Donna at major conferences around the world for many years to come, along with their two outstanding young metallurgists, Spencer Reeves and Jenna Hedderson. We wish them all well.

With Jenna and Spencer

Twitter @barrywills

First Announcement: Biomining '20 and Sustainable Minerals '20

In announcing these two forthcoming conferences, allow me to explain the change of name of the Biohydrometallurgy conference series to Biomining. This is to highlight the increasingly important role of biotechnology, not only in the treatment of primary ores and concentrates, but in the quest for the circular economy. Biotechnology is likely to have a major role in remediation, treatment of tailings, electronic and other wastes, and as a potential aid to processes such as flotation.

In this respect Biomining is intimately linked to the Sustainable Minerals series, which was very evident last month in Namibia, where over 60% of the Biohydromet '18 delegates also attended Sustainable Minerals '18.

Biomining '20 and Sustainable Minerals '20 will run back to back in June 2020 in the beautiful Cornish town of Falmouth. The venue will be the National Maritime Museum, in the heart of old Falmouth, overlooking the world's 3rd largest natural harbour. As in Namibia, there will be a single conference dinner (venue to be announced) to bring delegates from both conferences together.

Falmouth's inner harbour, with the Maritime Museum in the background

We invite your active participation in these two important events. If you would like to present papers, short abstracts should be submitted by the end of January, 2020. Drafts of accepted papers will be available at the meetings on Proceedings USBs, and after the conferences authors will be invited to submit final papers for peer-review, for possible publication in Minerals Engineering, all accepted papers being collated into virtual special issues.

Cornwall is one of the world's most beautiful areas, but as well as stunning coastal scenery it also has a rich mining heritage, so we always advise delegates to stay on for a few days to explore this unique and remote part of England. The Cornwall section of the blog might whet your appetite!

As the conferences evolve, updates on Biomining '20 will be posted at #Biomining20, and Sustainable Minerals '20 at #SustainableMinerals20.

Twitter @barrywills

Announcing the merger of another important mineral processing journal

In January of this year, a new-look Minerals Engineering was launched, with its merger with International Journal of Mineral Processing.

Next January, there will be another new-look journal, when Minerals & Metallurgical Processing (MMP), published by the Society for Mining, Metallurgy & Exploration (SME) becomes the international peer-reviewed journal Mining, Metallurgy & Exploration (MME) of the SME, which will be published by Springer Nature.

The scope of MMP will be broadened to represent the full spectrum of interests of the society. In six issues per year, this new journal with open access options will publish original research, in-depth reviews, short communications, and reviews of new technologies and industrial methodologies. Mary Poulton, co-director of the Lowell Institute for Mineral Resources at the University of Arizona, heads MME as its executive editor. She is supported by three section editors-in-chief responsible for the fields of mining, minerals and exploration, respectively: Jurgen Brune at the Colorado School of Mines, Ronel Kappes at Newmont USA, and Virginia McLemore at the New Mexico Bureau of Geology and Mineral Resources. In addition, MME has an international editorial board of more than 20 experts from academia, industry and government.

We welcome BASF, the latest major sponsor of Flotation '19

The giant international chemical company BASF had a very high profile at last year's Flotation '17, sponsoring and exhibiting for the first time and presenting its new range of frothers and collectors for sulphide and non-sulphide flotation at the booth. The international team of flotation experts, from offices in Australia, Germany, Russia and Turkey centred around Dr. Bettina Sobotka, the new head of Segment Flotation in BASF’s Mining Solutions. There were four technical papers from the company at the conference.

Bettina Sobotka with the BASF delegation at Flotation '17

So it is good to welcome BASF to its second MEI Conference, Flotation '19, the 11th sponsor of the conference so far. In confirming the sponsorship, Johanna Donath, of  Global Marketing Flotation, said "Recognizing Flotation´19 as THE key global flotation event, bringing together academia, engineering companies, chemical producers, service providers and mining companies, BASF is excited to be a sponsor for this event again. At our booth we will present our latest innovations in collectors and frothers. Flotation ´19 is a great opportunity to meet and talk to industry partners and academia about challenges faced by the industry, both today and in the future and to discuss our contribution to sustainable solutions".

The latest updates on the conference can be found at #Flotation19.

Current Flotation '19 sponsors

Twitter @barrywills

Prof. Doug Fuerstenau to be honoured by major international symposium

In my recent report on the SME Annual Meeting in Minneapolis, I bemoaned the fact that mineral processors were rather thin on the ground this year. The SME Meeting tends to attract people in our field when there is a mineral processing symposium in someone's honour. Next year we might expect a record turnout, as there is a very special symposium planned, in honour of one of the legends of minerals processing, Prof. Douglas Fuerstenau, who will be 90 years of age this coming December (see also posting of 20 July 2015).

The Mineral Processing Division of SME, in collaboration with the International Mineral Processing Council, will host this International Symposium, Reflections, Challenges and Opportunities in Minerals Processing, at the 2019 SME Annual Meeting to be held on February 24-27, 2019, in Denver, Colorado, USA (full details on MEI Online).

The symposium is planned to be a forum for presentation and discussion of the current state of the art in mineral processing, as well as an opportunity to identify the challenges and needs for the immediate future, and will consist of four sessions:

• Advances in flotation
• Comminution trends and challenges
• Mineral processing and renewable energy: challenges and opportunities
• Mineral processing in the digital era; innovations at the interface of IT/minerals engineering technology and education

Deadline for abstract submission is August 15, 2018. 

Twitter @barrywills

World rankings of Mineral and Mining Universities: here we go again!

You may remember that back in March I brought to your attention the 2018 QS Rankings of Mineral and Mining Engineering Universities, congratulating the Colorado School of Mines on their number 1 ranking for the 3rd year running.

This month the alternative listing, the ShanghaiRanking's Global Ranking of Mining & Mineral Engineering Universities has been published, and as always, there are glaring inconsistencies between the two systems.

Top 10 ShanghaiRanking

 

Perhaps not surprisingly five Chinese universities appear in the top 10 in the SR list, but none in the QS list. The Colorado School of Mines, so highly regarded by QS, is not even in the top 50 of the SR listings.

Of the top 10 in each list, only the University of Queensland (#1 in SR and #10 in QS), the University of Western Australia, the University of New South Wales, and McGill University, appear in both lists.

I will not comment further. I am sure that some of you will wish to do so!