The Centre for Water in the Minerals Industry (CWiMI) supports the sustainable management of water in the minerals and energy industries. Our Centre contributes to solving the engineering, environmental and social challenges of water management and engages with a wide range of research organisations and stakeholders in Australia and internationally.
The Centre’s research is funded principally by selected mining companies who are committed to sustainability performance.
CWiMI’s research focus areas include:
- managing water resources in a changing climate, using a global perspective and promoting comprehensive analysis
- system-thinking, which recognises that water is a shared and valuable resource affected by a complex set of surface, underground, climatic and anthropogenic phenomena
- spatial science that integrates and models the distribution of water-relevant characteristics in time and space
- society and water, where we incorporate social considerations into water management
- post-mining land and water management that fosters extensive engagement with multiple stakeholders to solve the water-related challenges associated with regional transitions in mine-closure scenarios.
Our Centre is one of the only research groups that applies High Reliability Organisational (HRO) thinking to enhance sustainability outcomes. We regularly review current and emerging global challenges in the resources industry to remain at the forefront of the mining sector’s response to closure, post mining transitions and climate change.
Environmental Geochemistry group
This group develops innovative tools for understanding and predicting geochemical processes, which underpin sustainable management of waste rock dumps, mineral processing tailings and final voids.
See more information on the Environmental Geochemistry group
Current projects
Currently updating list of projects. Please check back later.
Past projects
- Capacity Building of the Minerals Council of Australia Water Accounting Framework
- Norfolk Island Hydrological Assessment
- Water Sensitive Mining (ARC Future Fellowship)
- Observing Land & Water Footprints of Small-scale Land use change using High Resolution Satellite Images (Philippines – Cagayan)
- Protection of Rivers & Environmental Flows in Peru: Ocoña Pilot River Basin
- Assessment of Coal Mining-related Risks to the People, Environment & Economy in the Departments of Cundinamarca and Boyacá in Central Colombia
- Seawater Supplies to Manage Water Resources Risks & Opportunities in Northern Chile (Antofagasta)
- Quantifying the Economic Value of Water in Regions with Competition between Mining and other Water Users (Chile – Aconcagua)
- Salinity Tolerance of Freshwater Organisms from the Southern & Western Coalfields
- Swamp Hydrology Numerical Modelling for Advancing Rehabilitation Planning & Management
- Resetting our understanding of the Great Artesian Basin
- Water Use in the Surat Basin
- Recharge Estimation in the Surat Basin
- A Water Chemistry Atlas for the Gas Fields
- AQUA-ECO Health Sampling & Analysis Project
- Assessing the Ecotoxicology of Salinity on Organisms from Seasonally Flowing Streams in the Bowen Basin (QLD)
- Northern Bowen Basin Water & Salt Management Practices – Bowen Basin (QLD)
- SWAP: Social Water Assessment Protocol