Development of a Site Level Sustainability Opportunity and Analysis (SOTA) Tool

Risk management is a well-established approach to identifying and managing critical issues covering many aspects of modern coal mining operations. It is used extensively to address health and safety concerns, but also increasingly in environmental and other areas of management focus. Sustainable development is a less-developed but highly topical concept which is currently attracting much attention within the mining industry. The aim of the project was to extend the use of risk management processes to develop a simple tool which could be used to highlight the key "sustainability" issues for a particular operating site, as a first step towards improving the management and monitoring of outcomes in those areas. The project developed a tool incorporating broad qualitative risk assessment methodology, for use in an interactive workshop format. Key features include a focus on realizing opportunities as well as threats, and the inclusion of a defined information-gathering process step prior to the workshop in order to facilitate coverage of the broad range of issues involved. Trials of the tool were carried out at two coal operations in Central Queensland. The first involved the analysis of issues associated with the supply and management of water to mines and communities through a section of a large water infrastructure, whilst the second considered all operations of an open cut mine from a broad sustainability perspective. The application of a qualitative risk assessment methodology to issues of sustainable development at the operational level was well-accepted by industry participants. A large number of issues covering a broad range of impact areas were discussed and assessed. Opportunities to improve the process were identified as part of the workshops conducted, and incorporated into the final methodology described in the workbook. Future applications of the technique should aim to incorporate more involvement of external stakeholders, and also further develop methods of promoting an opportunity focus./p>