Minerals and Mining

Minerals and mining processing companies need to operate safely, maintain and grow profitability in a volatile global market, and improve sustainability.

At HRL we understand your challenges. Offering trusted expertise as your long-term partner, together we can transform your business performance by improving your asset reliability, optimising your operational efficiency and delivering long-term sustainability.

Your Challenges

• Delivering safe and reliable operations
• Delivering positive or enhanced cash flow
• Managing costs yet accessing the right capability to improve profitability

Our Solutions/Services 

• Trusted technical specialists to solve your difficult problems.
• Proven experience having partnered with many mining and minerals companies (e.g. Rio Tinto, Alcoa, Iluka).
• Track record of creating millions of dollars of value in cost reductions, avoidance, and process improvements.
• Experience across multiple resources (e.g. coal, bauxite, alumina, aluminium, mineral sands, silicon and iron ore).
• Expertise in the field of energy minerals and battery materials, including lithium/spodumene, vanadium, scandium, graphite, graphene, cobalt, nickel and copper; matching input quality parameters with emerging technology applications.

Your Challenges

• Safety of equipment and people
• Keeping the plant available; one day's downtime can cost millions of dollars
• Unreliable services such as air steam and water
• Budget pressure to reduce operations and maintenance costs
• Pressure to improve performance with less resources

Our Solutions/Services

• Trouble-shooting and failure analysis of operating equipment eg dredgers, reduction kilns, smelters, calciners, waste gas incinerators, heat recovery units, etc.
• Implementing process and technology solutions to reduce costs, manpower and improve production.
• Laboratory analytical services to manage quality and optimize productivity.  Adding value to by-products (e.g. optimising the generation of high-value activated carbon, briquetting to reduce processing losses).
• Remaining plant life assessments and risk-based inspection programs.
• Ensuring all statutory obligations of the business are fulfilled.
• Understanding the risk appetite of your organisation and designing your process to reflect that.

Your Challenges

• Safe operations in R&D
• Pressure to justify existence by delivering incremental and break-through improvements to processes
• Budget pressure means limited funds for the right in-house experts or partnerships
• Protecting intellectual property

Our Solutions/Services 

• Expert routine and non-routine analytical testing
• Outsourcing service to improve productivity and methods
• Laboratory and pilot-scale testing, drying, milling, calcination, reduction, hydrothermal processing
• Process design, modelling and optimisation, engineering and cost studies

Mineral processing plants need to economically and sustainably separate valuable minerals from waste. Numerous challenges exist for the optimisation of mineral processing plants in a cost-effective and energy-efficient manner.

At HRL we recognise that the challenge in improving the overall process is that making even small changes to optimise one section of the flowsheet can have unintended or unwanted impacts on several other sections. The key is to understand exactly what is happening within each area of a plant and with each aspect of the processing being undertaken, which requires a high level of holistic expertise.

At HRL that's exactly what we deliver, with experience across multiple industries. Unlike other service providers, we have decades of practical experience and unique high-tech testing capability along with advanced modelling techniques.

Over the years, we have partnered with some of the world's most reputable resources companies to solve problems and create millions of dollars of value including Rio Tinto, who consider us a strategic network partner.

When it comes to Minerals and Mining, you can count on HRL for Reliability, Efficiency, and Sustainability.