142 XXXI International Mineral Processing Congress 2024 Proceedings/Washington, DC/Sep 29–Oct 3
and supports the implementation of commitments in the
tailings governance framework but does not replace estab-
lished federal and local requirements, nor does it create
additional requirements.
The Tailings Management: Good Practice Guide
(ICMM 2021b) was later followed by the published
Conformance Protocols: Global Industry Standard on
Tailings Management (ICMM 2021a) providing operators
and independent third parties with clear criteria to support
implementation and enabling conformance to applicable
requirements of the GISTM.
Observed independent conformance audits to the
GISTM yielded efficacy of ICMM member companies
over 95% while still harboring known facility safety issues
(ICMM et al. 2020). It must be understood that confor-
mance does not ensure facility safety it only provides a
positive indication that the framework in place aligns with
successful facility management, which is a fundamental
aspect of any safe facility.
The GISTM and sister documents do establish valu-
able governance, developing and assigning key personnel
positions from which robust and successful facility safety
programs can be created. For those facilities with reten-
tion embankments, the technical limitations concern-
ing design and tailings management can be supported by
the International Committee on Large Dams (ICOLD)
Bulletin 194, which provides a robust framework from
which to design and manage tailings storage facilities. The
bulletin draws from existing guidance, including those
prepared by the Australian National Committee on Large
Dams (ANCOLD), the Canadian Dams Association
(CDA) (2019), the Mining Association of Canada (MAC)
(2017, 2019), and the ICMM that align with the principles
and practices established by the GISTM. However, even
these guides are limited to issues of stability management as
they promote adherence to limit-equilibrium approaches,
which can be misleading and or readily misused in the tail-
ings facility world.
The GISTM is unable to fully guard against a tailings
facility failure as tailings storage facility stability ultimately
relies on critical engineering principles. Facility safety is not
founded in environmental compliance, social responsibility,
or, to a lesser extent, governance, although these are impor-
tant to the social license to operate. The ICMM Tailings
Management: Good Practice Guide (ICMM 2021b) does
venture into a suggested engineering approach, requiring
competent engineers to translate the strong guidance into
practice. If we are to be successful in safe tailings manage-
ment, we must have sufficient numbers of qualified people
with the ability and understanding of what is required to
safely operate and manage a tailings storage facility.
ENGINEERING RESOURCES AND
SUSTAINABILITY
The technical demands and elevation of the EoR in the
GISTM governance chain raise the question, “Do we have
enough resources available to address our current needs?”
The short answer is no, and we will have insufficient
resources for the foreseeable future. Hatton et al. (2020)
began looking at available industry resources in 2018. Their
work is focused on the EoR duties as they apply to safe tail-
ings storage facility operations. The labor estimates consid-
ered contributions from the EoR (inclusive of design), the
Accountable Executive, the ITRB/technical reviewers, the
RTFE, and supporting technical staff such as the deputy
EOR. An important note: The estimates do not address
engineering needs for capital projects, sustaining capital
projects, and some operational expenditures.
The work by Hatton et al. (2020) attempted to quantify
the labor demands necessary to support the EOR. The work
included estimating the number of tailings dams worldwide
using general assumptions, and binning known dams based
on embankment height and surface area. Spencer et al.
estimated 16,000 tailings dams worldwide and calculated
the resulting labor demand of 17,800 full-time equivalents
(one person per year) for a value of 1.1 engineers per tail-
ings dam worldwide. Ongoing estimates as of this writing
suggests that the number of tailings dams may significantly
exceed the 16,000-dam value by a large margin. The neces-
sary resources do not presently exist within the industry.
The most significant challenge facing our industry is
the lack of qualified resources. The term “qualified” encom-
passes a combination of technical expertise in the civil and
geologic engineering disciplines along with commiserate
practical design and construction experience and high-
quality interpersonal skills (emotional IQ). These combina-
tions of skills are critical to serving this role.
The qualified engineering skills with the requisite tech-
nical expertise and experience to design these facilities are
developed through a unique combination of university
education coupled with real-world design and construction
experience. The EoR typically will be a qualified subject
matter expert (SME) in one discipline, such as geotechni-
cal engineering or hydrotechnical engineering, but with a
working knowledge of the other disciplines, including engi-
neering geology, hydrology, hydrogeology, geochemical,
environmental, mechanical, electrical, process. The EoR
will understand how the beneficiation process works, how
the tailings is generated with given properties, and how
and supports the implementation of commitments in the
tailings governance framework but does not replace estab-
lished federal and local requirements, nor does it create
additional requirements.
The Tailings Management: Good Practice Guide
(ICMM 2021b) was later followed by the published
Conformance Protocols: Global Industry Standard on
Tailings Management (ICMM 2021a) providing operators
and independent third parties with clear criteria to support
implementation and enabling conformance to applicable
requirements of the GISTM.
Observed independent conformance audits to the
GISTM yielded efficacy of ICMM member companies
over 95% while still harboring known facility safety issues
(ICMM et al. 2020). It must be understood that confor-
mance does not ensure facility safety it only provides a
positive indication that the framework in place aligns with
successful facility management, which is a fundamental
aspect of any safe facility.
The GISTM and sister documents do establish valu-
able governance, developing and assigning key personnel
positions from which robust and successful facility safety
programs can be created. For those facilities with reten-
tion embankments, the technical limitations concern-
ing design and tailings management can be supported by
the International Committee on Large Dams (ICOLD)
Bulletin 194, which provides a robust framework from
which to design and manage tailings storage facilities. The
bulletin draws from existing guidance, including those
prepared by the Australian National Committee on Large
Dams (ANCOLD), the Canadian Dams Association
(CDA) (2019), the Mining Association of Canada (MAC)
(2017, 2019), and the ICMM that align with the principles
and practices established by the GISTM. However, even
these guides are limited to issues of stability management as
they promote adherence to limit-equilibrium approaches,
which can be misleading and or readily misused in the tail-
ings facility world.
The GISTM is unable to fully guard against a tailings
facility failure as tailings storage facility stability ultimately
relies on critical engineering principles. Facility safety is not
founded in environmental compliance, social responsibility,
or, to a lesser extent, governance, although these are impor-
tant to the social license to operate. The ICMM Tailings
Management: Good Practice Guide (ICMM 2021b) does
venture into a suggested engineering approach, requiring
competent engineers to translate the strong guidance into
practice. If we are to be successful in safe tailings manage-
ment, we must have sufficient numbers of qualified people
with the ability and understanding of what is required to
safely operate and manage a tailings storage facility.
ENGINEERING RESOURCES AND
SUSTAINABILITY
The technical demands and elevation of the EoR in the
GISTM governance chain raise the question, “Do we have
enough resources available to address our current needs?”
The short answer is no, and we will have insufficient
resources for the foreseeable future. Hatton et al. (2020)
began looking at available industry resources in 2018. Their
work is focused on the EoR duties as they apply to safe tail-
ings storage facility operations. The labor estimates consid-
ered contributions from the EoR (inclusive of design), the
Accountable Executive, the ITRB/technical reviewers, the
RTFE, and supporting technical staff such as the deputy
EOR. An important note: The estimates do not address
engineering needs for capital projects, sustaining capital
projects, and some operational expenditures.
The work by Hatton et al. (2020) attempted to quantify
the labor demands necessary to support the EOR. The work
included estimating the number of tailings dams worldwide
using general assumptions, and binning known dams based
on embankment height and surface area. Spencer et al.
estimated 16,000 tailings dams worldwide and calculated
the resulting labor demand of 17,800 full-time equivalents
(one person per year) for a value of 1.1 engineers per tail-
ings dam worldwide. Ongoing estimates as of this writing
suggests that the number of tailings dams may significantly
exceed the 16,000-dam value by a large margin. The neces-
sary resources do not presently exist within the industry.
The most significant challenge facing our industry is
the lack of qualified resources. The term “qualified” encom-
passes a combination of technical expertise in the civil and
geologic engineering disciplines along with commiserate
practical design and construction experience and high-
quality interpersonal skills (emotional IQ). These combina-
tions of skills are critical to serving this role.
The qualified engineering skills with the requisite tech-
nical expertise and experience to design these facilities are
developed through a unique combination of university
education coupled with real-world design and construction
experience. The EoR typically will be a qualified subject
matter expert (SME) in one discipline, such as geotechni-
cal engineering or hydrotechnical engineering, but with a
working knowledge of the other disciplines, including engi-
neering geology, hydrology, hydrogeology, geochemical,
environmental, mechanical, electrical, process. The EoR
will understand how the beneficiation process works, how
the tailings is generated with given properties, and how