At the opening today. From left: Jonathan Law, Director, Minerals Down Under Flagship; Dr Neal Wai Poi, Director, CSIRO Chile Centre of Excellence; Orlando Jimenez, Business Development Manager, CSIRO Chile Centre of Excellence; Dr Megan Clark, Chief Executive, CSIRO; Terry Cutler, Chairman CSIRO Chile Centre of Excellence board; Dr Calum Drummond, Group Executive, CSIRO Manufacturing, Materials and Minerals Group; Jaqueline Quezada, Operations and Finance Manager, CSIRO Chile Centre of Excellence; Javier Ruiz del Solar, Director, AMTC, University of Chile.
For all of you that haven’t heard CSIRO has set up shop in Chile and today the Centre’s Northern Node in Antofagasta will be opened.
We’ve joined with the Chileans to work on some of the challenges for our respective minerals industries – through the CSIRO Chile International Centre of Excellence in Mining and Mineral Processing.
With the support (and combined brain power) of our partners we have dedicated the next 10 years to creating technologies that will hopefully reduce the environmental impact of mining while also increasing productivity.
Why Chile, you ask? Chile has very similar mining environments to Australia, where issues like water scarcity, energy efficiency, arid environments and deeper mines are ongoing challenges.
The CSIRO Chile Centre of Excellence is co-funded by CORFO and supported by the Universities of Antofagasta and Chile, Cicitem and major industry partners Anglo American North S.A. and South S.A., Antofagasta Minerals S.A., BHP Chile Inc, Codelco, Xstrata Copper Chile.
