Mapping the risks

The global database that highlights supply risk for critical metals

world map on gold mineral granite and blue marble sheet luxury interior texture surface top

Image credit: Adobe Stock / darkfoxelixir

Image credit: Adobe Stock / darkfoxelixir

In 2018, the Complex Orebodies Program undertook a project to create a matrix of risks that the mining industry must overcome to unlock copper reserves. This work, led by Dr Eléonore Lèbre, has evolved and developed into an even more layered global mining dataset that quantifies risks for companies across a range of indicators. The findings have a key role to play in equitably planning how and where to mine, and ensuring a just transition to a low carbon future.

The focus of the dataset is to highlight the barriers to developing a site, which will inform companies about how to ‘unlock’ orebodies to meet future mineral demand.

These barriers may be a result of low-grade ore, technical challenges, political unrest, social outrage or environmental challenges.

Layering risks to create a global atlas

Starting with the eight main indicators of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) risk (water, tailings, biodiversity, social vulnerability, land uses, Indigenous peoples, political fragility, approvals and permits), a huge global dataset of mining projects were overlaid.

This includes current or soon-to-begin projects, and the mining source risk database holds about 36,000 mine sites. Spatial data is then layered on top, and more indicators are placed on that.

Dr Lèbre said over the last three years she has been using around 50 different global datasets.

“These are the different layers you add on the map. And it’s far from static – it’s always changing, and the method is evolving over time,” she said.

Researchers can then use global data about mining projects and ESG information to work out and quantify the risks that would come with operating mines and making new discoveries.

“There are a few datasets published out there with different purposes, but they don’t focus on mining. In this project, the data I have access to is reported by mining companies.

“It’s the first time that someone has created a map like this. There are no other methodologies like it, and none have examined the supply source [mine sites] before.”
Dr Eléonore Lèbre

Image credit: Adobe Stock / Pamela Au

Raw copper ore

Environmental, social and governance risks pose justice and financial threats

Undoubtedly, mining activities significantly change their host environments and exacerbate vulnerabilities that already exist – particularly in places with inadequate governance to prevent impacts to the environment and communities.

Already, many mining projects experience delays or abandonment because ESG risks become reality.

Dr Lèbre said the trend will continue if projects are not designed and developed more innovatively.

“Additionally, the growing demand for energy transition metals (ETMs) necessary for the transition to a low-carbon future could create high-risk mining ‘hotspots’ that will put further pressure on communities and environments.

World map with hot spots, cold spots marked.

World map with indicated hotspots. Supplied by Dr Lèbre.

World map with indicated hotspots. Supplied by Dr Lèbre.

“Our research quantitatively confirms people’s concerns that without strategic planning to address the risks from mining, transitioning to a low-carbon economy will lead to higher ESG–risk mining.

“Proactively managing ESG risks that accompany ETM mining can increase a company’s long-term value but, more importantly, is at the core of the ‘just transition’ concept.”

These high-risk mining hotspots place pressure on environments and their communities:
▪ High-risk iron orebody areas often experience social vulnerability, political fragility, and approvals and permits challenges.
▪ Bauxite orebodies (the main source of aluminium) are nearly all located in high-risk contexts.
▪ Copper orebodies are often plagued by water and waste risks – 65 per cent are in areas with medium to extremely high water risk.

“People interested in mapping these risks include the mining industry, investors, governments, and downstream users of metals, who are all dependent on accessing the fruits of these complex orebodies. It will be up to these people to ensure ESG risks in mining locations are managed appropriately.

“Companies that seek to create new projects will face social challenges if they do not demonstrate their credentials and plans for evaluating, managing and reducing ESG risks – ultimately putting limits on the supply of ETMs.

“We believe the synergies and trade-offs at the source of ETM supply chains [at mine sites] should be interrogated with greater focus and depth than has occurred to date,” Dr Lèbre said.

“Our mining atlas generates global knowledge, and pulls together the global picture and all its patterns. It’s not dependent on internal knowledge at each mining company, where it can disappear if one person leaves.”

Image credit: Adobe Stock / poco_bw

Drone pilot in PPE clothing operating a drone

Industry demand and an Early Career Researcher award

Dr Lèbre and her team have been working with industry research consortia, as well as projects with industry partners including Rio Tinto, Newcrest, MMG and OceanaGold.

She has applied her methodology to benchmarking projects at various companies, benchmarking against peers to evaluate risk levels for projects, and portfolio analysis for companies (for risks and complexity) – by varying the scale and the data used.

Dr Lèbre coordinated the database projects across SMI centres, and the versatility and timeliness of the project has led to seven industry-commissioned projects.

“It has taken many forms over the last few years, and it’s quite multidisciplinary, and very broad. There is a lot of demand from industry,” she said.

Dr Lèbre's work on complex orebodies was recently recognised and rewarded with an Australian Research Council’s (ARC) Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA) to further enhance her research.

“I’ll look for data reported about the projects themselves: qualitative data. I can access companies’ reports of what happens at the mine site, and will process and categorise it to create a global repository of data about local-level sites.”

Dr Lèbre said it would be “an eye-opener” for whoever wanted to see the material and financial consequences of not managing ESG risks that come with energy transition.

“The social and environmental implications of the anticipated rise in ETMs’ extraction are rarely acknowledged in energy transition scenarios, but the complexity of complex orebodies is not just something that is below the ground.”

Contact details

Dr Éléonore Lèbre
Research Fellow, ARC
Centre for Social Responsibility in Mining
Sustainable Minerals Institute, The University of Queensland

Email: e.lebre@uq.edu.au
Profile: smi.uq.edu.au/profile/2537/eleonore-lebre

Eléonore Lèbre portrait

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