Industry News

The Victorian Government has appointed three members to the Sustainability Victoria (SV) Board. The new members are Mr Ron Lovett and Mr Tony Hinton. An existing member, Ms Suzanne Evans, has been reappointed to the board.

"Now that the SV review has been considered and a new strategy developed that reshapes the organisation's focus, the new SV board will be working to deliver on this new vision for greater resource efficiency across Victoria," said board Chair, Dr Gillian Sparkes.

"With several board positions lapsing in April this year, it was important to ensure appointments to these positions could achieve a balance between board continuity and renewal."

The three appointed members replace outgoing members Ms Carolyn Lloyd, Dr Tony Marxsen, Ms Tanya Ha and Dr Nicholas Gruen.  Dr Sparkes, Mr Mike Hill, Mr Ross McCann and Ms Cheryl Batagol will continue as board members until July 2014.

The Sustainability Victoria Board is: Dr Gillian Sparkes, Chair (PhD, MBA, GAICD) ; Mike Hill, Deputy Chair; Cheryl Batagol, Chair of the Victorian Environment Protection Authority (EPA) and is a member of the Victorian Catchment Management Council; Suzanne Evans; Ross McCann, Executive Chairman of Qenos and President of the Plastics and Chemicals Industry Association; Ron Lovett, Executive Manager - Business Strategy and Management of Abigroup; and Tony Hinton, consultant in economic policy and public policy issues.

The Federal Government has announced future contracts for the Disability Employment Services-Employment Support Service, which will run for the next five years.

Minister for Employment Participation Kate Ellis said the spending will allow for an unprecedented level of support in helping people with disabilities find work.

“All Australians have a right to the dignity and self respect that employment brings and without access to paid employment, people with a disability risk life on the margins of our community,” Ms Ellis said.

The announcement comes after the Australian Government released the Disability Employment Services Star Ratings – which reveal the services that are performing well and those that need to improve.

These March quarter Star Ratings will be used as a basis to determine, which service providers will be required to re-bid for their existing business later this year.

Services performing at the 4 and 5 star level will not be required to re-tender but will be given the opportunity to expand and assist more job seekers in new areas.

The Australian Federation of Disability Organisations, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and the Industry and Disability Employment Australia welcomed the announcements.

“The additional two years will allow DES providers to develop and maintain supportive relationships with employers and most importantly with the over 75,000 people with enduring disability in the program,” Lynette May of Disability Employment Australia said.

View the performance ratings at www.jobsearch.gov.au/provider

A Productivity Commission report, Impact of COAG Reforms:  Business Regulation and VET, has found the COAG reforms of the Vocational and Education Training (VET) system, signed by the Prime Minister and state and territory leaders last month, will create more jobs, increase productivity, grow the economy and boost the wages of Australians.

The report confirms that an individual who is awarded a Certificate III or IV as a result of these reforms will have improved earnings of more than $324,632 over their working life.

The Productivity Commission’s findings included:

* Vocational education and training reforms are aimed at improving the overall quality of the workforce and encouraging higher workforce participation, through increased VET provision and greater flexibility in courses offered.

– Attainment of the COAG 2020 targets has the potential to raise GDP by two per cent.

– It would also assist in achieving COAG’s broader social inclusion goals.

* Increased effort by governments will be required for the full potential of the COAG reform agenda to be realised. 

* A number of areas offer opportunities for even better outcomes. In particular:

– initiatives to increase VET completion rates;

– ensuring VET reforms are sequenced so that the building blocks are in place for the successful transition to more contestable markets including, L strengthening quality control through cost-effective independent validation and auditing of training organisations’ assessment practices; and L making information available to students on the costs of training, quality and labour market outcomes for individual training organizations;

– greater autonomy and capacity for TAFEs to compete with other providers; and

– tying payments to outcomes.

The Productivity Commission’s Report is at www.pc.gov.au.

Minister for Climate Change and Energy Efficiency, Greg Combet, has announced the appointment of Professor Veena Sahjwalla to the Climate Commission.

Professor Sahajwalla is Associate Dean Strategic Industry Relations, Faculty of Science and Director of the Centre of Sustainable Materials Research & Technology at the University of New South Wales.  She has research and development expertise in the fields of energy efficiency, sustainable materials and recycling and invented a process of recycling plastics and rubber tyres in steelmaking.

Professor Sahajwalla will replace Dr Susannah Elliot, who stepped down from her role to continue her work with the Australian Science Media Centre.

"Professor Sahajwalla has conducted world-leading research in collaboration with major resources companies in Australia. Professor Sahajwalla's understanding of Australian industries together with her expertise in science communication will be valuable additions to the Climate Commission,” Mr Combet said.

Curtin University researchers have used computational fluid dynamics and powerful supercomputers to create new models for understanding and predicting coral bleaching.

A phenomenon that has increased in magnitude over the past two decades, coral bleaching is attributed to an elevation of sea surface temperatures combined with the sun’s irradiation.

While bleaching is generally expected in response to a one to two degree temperature increase over a prolonged period, the new models consider phenomena such as coral porosity and permeability, morphology, mass and most importantly water flow and heat transfer.

Dr Ben Mullins of Curtin’s Fluid Dynamics Research Group said due to their shape and surface area, some corals are likely to be more susceptible to bleaching.

“One of the elements ignored until now is water flow, which can significantly influence the thermal microenvironment of the coral as water flows through and around it,” he said.

“Basically, we’ve taken an engineering approach to an issue that biologists have been looking at for years and come up with a completely new method to predict how much corals warm.”

He said outcomes from the computer models were shown to be consistent with outcomes from laboratory experiments, indicating validity of the new approach.

“The models have the advantage of providing three-dimensional temperature and flow information down to very precise resolution compared to previous methods reliant on microprobes,” he said.

“They are also sufficiently flexible to accommodate large-scale in-situ modelling.”

Dr Mullins said the next step was to apply the models more broadly to entire coral reefs.

“Given the scale of these structures, it’s very hard to get good data out in the field,” he said.

“Traditionally, researchers have measured temperature and flow at different points, which isn’t an accurate representation of the larger system.

“Our models are much more comprehensive.

“Given that the Great Barrier Reef is worth $6 billion from tourism alone to the Australian economy, there’s immense value in reef conservation.”

Coral consist of a calcite skeleton with a layer of living tissue. They live in a symbiotic relationship with zooxanthellae, single-celled plants/algae, with both providing nutrients for survival.

Coral bleaching occurs when zooxanthellae are expelled by coral or lose their pigmentation. Under some circumstances coral can recover, but in most cases they die.

Published in PLoS One, the research was spearheaded by Curtin’s Fluid Dynamics Research Group with the Australian Institute of Marine Science. The work was made possible through use of the iVEC@Murdoch supercomputer, Epic, via OpenFOAM software.

The Board of Coalworks has urged the company’s shareholders to reject Whitehaven Coal’s takeover offer, describing the move as ‘inadequate and opportunistic and that it significantly undervalues’ the company.

The board outlined the main reasons in rejecting the offer:

• The offer does not reflect the inherent value of Coalworks’ portfolio of assets nor their growth potential at a time when Coalworks is moving closer to delivering on its strategy of building an independent Australian coal producer.
• The offer is opportunistic and has been timed to coincide with a separate attempt to destabilise Coalworks by calling a General Meeting to alter composition of the Board by removing Coalworks’ Independent Chairman and Chief Executive Officer.
• The offer does not reflect the significant synergistic benefits that Whitehaven could achieve by gaining control of Coalworks.

A new research cluster called the Methane Research Cluster has been formed to focus on reduction of livestock methane emissions in Australia, which accounts for  10 per cent of the country’s overall greenhouse gas emissions.

A team of Australian and international scientists have teamed up with CSIRO’s Sustainable Agriculture Flagship to help address one of the key contributors of methane emissions – burping livestock.

The collaboration, led by researchers from the University of Melbourne, aims to improve measurement and management of methane emissions for the grazing lands of northern Australia thought to be responsible for five per cent of the country’s overall greenhouse gas emissions.

Professor Deli Chen, Project Leader from the University of Melbourne, said the Cluster will be able to draw on the skills of world-leading research institutes to accurately measure methane emissions from livestock under real grazing conditions.

“This is a critical step if we are to help agriculture reduce its emissions because if you can’t measure, you can’t mitigate,” Professor Chen said.

CSIRO’s Research Project Leader, Dr Ed Charmley, said, “The Australian Government’s Clean Energy Act sets a long-term goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 80 per cent of 2000 levels by the year 2050. This research will help identify field-based measurement techniques and protocols that can support management actions and technologies that can help Australia meet such ambitious targets.”

“The Cluster will also develop science that supports methodology development for the Carbon Farming Initiative, an Australian Government program that enables farmers to earn ‘carbon credits’ for undertaking abatement activities on their properties,” Dr Charmley said.

CSIRO’s Flagship Collaboration Fund will fund the Cluster for over three years, with support from several other Australian universities including Macquarie University, RMIT Victoria, University of New England, University of Western Australia, and University of Wollongong as well as researchers at Agriculture and AgriFood Canada and the University of Alberta.

The Federal Government has launched the National Infrastructure Construction Schedule (NICS) which will provide details on every economic and social project valued at $50 million or more being planned or delivered by governments around the country—Federal, state and local.

Developed by the Federal Department of Infrastructure and Transport, the website, www.nics.gov.au, currently lists 56 projects worth over $50 billion.

Previously, those interested in financing or building infrastructure had to rely on ‘word of mouth’ or websites and newspapers to find what was available, a process which advantaged larger investors and the big construction companies.

Announcing the NICS service, the Minister for Infrastructure and Transport, Anthony Albanese said that irrespective of their location, investors and infrastructure providers now have equal access to the same information about both the immediate and longer term opportunities which exist in Australia.

Energy management specialist Schneider Electric has made a senior appointment which will aim to further increase its business focus and integrated solution offering to the Australian water and wastewater sector.

Simon Zander has been appointed as the company's General Manager, Water and Wastewater, Schneider Electric Industry Business. In this role, he will help Australian water and wastewater organisations tackle the operational and energy-efficiency challenges they face.

Zander has over 20 years’ experience in the water industry. As General Manager of Serck Controls, he led the company in its integration into the Schneider Electric business at the beginning of 2012.

“In 2012, the water industry will be focused on increasing operational productivity and efficiencies. To achieve these efficiencies, we expect to see greater demand for real-time information access so operational decisions can be made more quickly,” said Zander.

Construction of Tasmania’s largest ever irrigation project is ready to start in the state’s Midlands region after the Federal and State governments gave final approvals for the $104 million Midlands Water Scheme.

Major design and construction contracts have been awarded and work will begin next month, creating 130 direct jobs during the two years it will take to build the scheme.

Federal Minister for Water Tony Burke said the project will significantly boost food production and employment throughout the region.

“Once complete, this scheme will provide a strong foundation for Tasmania’s growing food processing sector. Based on experiences elsewhere around Tasmania it is expected to create up to 300 on farm jobs over time,” Mr Burke said.

The Midlands Water Scheme takes water from Arthurs Lake before distributing it to farms within an irrigable area of 55,680 hectares.

Water from Arthurs Lake will be taken by 34km of mostly buried high pressure pipeline down the Western Tiers to a new mini-hydroelectric plant and small holding dam west of Tunbridge. From there a network of 103km of mostly buried pipelines and sections of waterways will get the water to farmers for productive agricultural use.

The Federal Government will contribute $55 million to the project, while the private sector has contributed $37 million and $12 million from the State Government.

Major contracts were awarded to Tasmanian companies Hazell Bros Group and Zest Pty Ltd with Australian-based contractor, Fulton Hogan Construction Pty Ltd the other successful tenderer.

Westgold has announced it has accepted the $92 million merger deal floated by substantial shareholder Metals X. The deal will see Westgold shareholders receive 11 Metals X shares for every 10 Westgold shares held, based on the closing price of Metals X shares on 9 May.

The final merged company will include a portfolio including:

• growth assets including the producing Renison Tin Project (Metals X share 50%) and the Rentails Tin Project in Tasmania, the massive Wingellina Nickel Project and Central Murchison Project in WA and the Rover 1 Copper-gold Project in NT
• An experienced evaluation and development team comprising members of both companies capable of rapidly progressing the combined assets of the two groups
• Cash and listed investments in excess of $100 million
• A market capitalisation in excess of $330 million with the potential for a marketing re-rating

Westgold’s Chairman, Michael Atkins, said that the merger will give the company’s a stronger market valuation, which will reflect the company’s strong asset base.

Metals X is currently the largest shareholder of Westgold with a shareholding interest of 26.98% and has been Westgold’s largest shareholder since 2007. Metals X currently holds two nominee director positions on the board of Westgold, being Mr Peter Cook and Mr Warren Hallam.

Treasurer Mike Baird today announced the NSW Government has successfully refinanced the Sydney Desalination Plant for $2.3 billion, a result which is well above the book value.

The proceeds will be used to repay the debt held against the asset, with net proceeds of more than $300 million to be invested in the NSW Government’s infrastructure fund – Restart NSW.

Mr Baird said the NSW Government has accepted a binding offer to refinance the desalination plant from a consortium including the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan Board, Hastings managed infrastructure funds Utilities Trust of Australia and The Infrastructure Fund.

“The selection of the consortium for the long term lease of the Sydney Desalination Plant is a great outcome for the people of NSW,” said Mr Baird.

As part of the transaction, Sydney Water has entered into a 50 year water supply agreement with SDP. Prices in this agreement are regulated by IPART.

BHP Billiton has announced the appointment of Pat Davies as the company’s new independent Non-Executive Director, effective June.

Mr Davies was previously the Chief Executive of Sasol Limited until his retirement in June last year, having worked in the position since 2005 where he oversaw substantial international growth.

“Pat’s appointment is a welcome addition to an already strong Board, providing additional experience in the oil and gas industry in particular. His corporate experience in the natural resources sector across a number of geographies, commodities and markets, will ensure a significant contribution to the Board,”  BHP Billiton Chairman Jac Nasser said.

Leighton Contractors has been awarded a $93 million Engineer, Procure and Construct (EPC) contract for the temporary site facilities works at Blaydin Point, Darwin as part of the Ichthys project being developed by JKC Australia LNG.

The works will see Leighton construct temporary buildings, temporary utilities and temporary civil works.

“The successful award of this project sees Leighton Contractors’ work-in-hand for oil and gas projects reach more than $3billion. We service the gas and hydrocarbons processing sectors in Australia, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea, with a focused effort in the areas of liquid natural gas, synthetic fuels, natural gas compression and transmission, and coal seam gas production,” Leighton Contractor’s National General Manager Oil and Gas Graem Dunn said.

The Temporary Site Facilities Works project is due for completion in March 2014.

Abigroup has won a $40 million contract by the Hunter Water Corporation to construct a new water recycling plant as part of the broader Hunter Treatment Alliance suite of works.

Abigroup will construct the Kooragang Industrial Water Scheme (LIWS), which will involve the construction of a new water reuse plant that will use the micro-filtration reverse osmosiss process.

Abigroup’s Ian Hutchinson, who is the Hunter Treatment Alliance Program Manager, said, “I’m very excited that Hunter Water Corporation Board has decided to deliver the KIWS project using the Hunter Treatment Alliance delivery model.

“We believe that the KIWS team have found the best technical and value for money solution available to Hunter Water Corporation for this type of project.”

The project includes an on-site education centre building, discharge and return water pipelines and the design, construction and commissioning of all telemetry and control systems for the scheme.

Design work is set to start in May 2012 with site mobilisation expected to commence in December 2012. The project is expected to be completed by mid-2014.

The Hunter Treatment Alliance is carrying out a $240 million five-year program of works with the Hunter Water Corporation designed to enable the region to cater for increased population growth and ensure the plants operate reliably and sustainably into the future.

The program includes the upgrade of 13 existing wastewater treatment plants in the Newcastle region. The scope of work varies for each of the wastewater treatment plants but mainly includes the design, procurement, construction and commissioning of the upgraded plants.

The Australian Public Service Commission has released its snAPShot summary of employment for the calendar year to December 31, 2011.

The report shows that at 31 December there were 167,721 staff in the APS. This total comprised:

• 153,881 ongoing staff (up by 1.7% from 151,380 in December 2010)
• 13,840 non-ongoing staff (up by 13.4% from 12,205 in December 2010)

During 2011:

• 12,713 ongoing employees were engaged to the APS
• 10,155 ongoing employees separated from the APS

The snAPShot summary is available here.

NOPSEMA, Australia’s national independent regulator for offshore petroleum health and safety, well integrity and environmental management, has released the latest health and safety performance report for Australia’s offshore petroleum industry.

The report contains data of inspections, investigations and information collected from 35 operators and 209 facilities operating in Commonwealth waters (and relevant coastal waters) to December 2011. Health and safety categories covered in the report include injuries, complaints, investigations and enforcements.

The authoritative report identifies signs of progress in industry safety performance. For example:

• no fatalities were recorded during the reporting period (July 2010-December 2011);

• the rate of major injuries has been decreasing since 2008.

Recalling the lives lost in the BP Macondo blowout in the Gulf of Mexico in April 2010 and the impact of the PTT EP Montara blowout in the Timor Sea in 2009, NOPSEMA CEO Jane Cutler warned that industry could not afford to be complacent at any stage of offshore petroleum exploration and production.

“Strong safety performance is fundamental to restoring confidence in an industry that has seen the tragic consequences of inadequate risk prevention.”

The Offshore Health and Safety Performance Report identifies design, procedures and preventive maintenance as the top three root causes of accidents and dangerous occurrences.

Ms Cutler acknowledged the role of the regulator in driving continuous improvement in minimising risks to workers, noting an increase in inspections and enforcement actions in 2011.

“From the early design stages of a facility to the end of its lifecycle, it is up to operators and industry regulators alike to be vigilant in their commitment to the safety of people working offshore.”

In the interests of sharing safety lessons for industry, the report documents 57 incidents investigated in the 18 months to 31 December 2011, including accidents involving injuries to workers and dangerous occurrences that could have caused death or serious injury.

The report reveals there were three major hydrocarbon gas releases reported in 2011.

“Uncontrolled hydrocarbon releases are of particular concern due to their potential to cause ignition. Preventing releases of this nature should continue to be a top priority for operators”, Ms Cutler said.

NOPSEMA was established in January 2012 following the Final Government Response to the Report of the Montara Commission of Inquiry (2011) and a decision to extend the health and safety remit of the National Offshore Petroleum Safety Authority (NOPSA) to include well integrity and environmental management. NOPSEMA superseded NOPSA as the single national regulator for offshore facilities and activities in Commonwealth waters, as well as designated coastal waters where powers have been conferred.

The Offshore Health and Safety Performance Report can be accessed at www.nopsema.gov.au

The NSW parliamentary inquiry into workers compensation, undertaken by a Joint Select Committee established on May 2, is underway.

The Committee, chaired by Robert Borsak of the Shooters and Fishers Party, will inquire into and report on:

• the performance of the Scheme in the key objectives of promoting better health outcomes and return to work outcomes for injured workers,
• the financial sustainability of the Scheme and its impact on the New South Wales economy, current and future jobs in New South Wales and the State’s competitiveness, and
• the functions and operations of the WorkCover Authority.

The Committee will also examine the WorkCover NSW Actuarial valuation of outstanding claims liability for the NSW Workers Compensation Nominal Insurer as at 31 December 2011, and the External peer review of outstanding claims liabilities of the Nominal Insurer as at 31 December 2011.

Submissions have been called for and the Committee will be holding public hearings on Monday 21st and Friday 25th May 2012.

More information is here.

Scientists have developed a new diagnostic tool that will enable better understanding of global climate patterns.

The development, by researchers from The University of Queensland, University of Canterbury (New Zealand) and Monash University, distinguishes between the causes of particles in glacial deposits – whether climactic or caused by rock avalanche – allowing for more accurate data to inform climate models.

Co-author of the study, UQ Professor James Shulmeister, says the development represents a breakthrough in the way climate change research is approached.

He says that while glaciers have been used as an early indicator of the extent and rate of global warming, there was previously an assumption that they always reflected climatic change.

“But there has been some debate on how much of the mountain glacier record represents climate change and how much relates to changes in glaciers resulting from rock avalanches onto the glaciers,” he said.

“Being able to determine whether a glacial advance is caused by a rock avalanche or by purely climatic factors enables us to ensure the climatic record from glacial deposits is accurate.

“Using this information we will be able to better understand our changing climate and inform the creation of climate models.”

The research, published in the April issue of the prestigious journal Geology, represents a major breakthrough in the fields of both landslide (rock avalanche) research and climate change from glaciers.

Lead researcher Dr Natalya Reznichenko says the cause of glacial deposits is more complex than originally thought and that some deposits that were previously identified as being of climatic origin are in fact the products of readvances triggered by the deposition of rock avalanche debris on glaciers.

“We discovered that during rock avalanches, intense fragmentation of rock generates extremely fine particles – much less than a thousandth of a millimetre across - that cluster together to form agglomerates,” she said.

“These agglomerates are completely absent from glacial deposits known to lack rock avalanche material.

“This discovery comes from long-term research on rock avalanches by my colleague Professor Tim Davies, a co-author of the paper.

“Using these particles as indicators we are able to determine whether a glacial advance is driven by climatic factors or is a result of rock avalanches.”

The results provide a diagnostic tool to identify glacial deposits that might be caused by rock avalanches from those clearly caused by climate.

“It is important to note that the presence of rock avalanche debris does not prove that a glacial deposit was the result of a rock avalanche-driven advance, but that this possibility cannot be ignored if rock avalanche material is present,” Dr Reznichenko said.

The new diagnostic tool has been tested on glacial deposits at Mt Cook in New Zealand, that have been used previously to infer past climate changes.

At least two of these have been proven to contain rock-avalanche material, and their dates are similar to those of past Alpine fault earthquakes – leading to the possibility that the rock avalanches might have been earthquake-triggered.

Unions NSW has led a delegation of injured workers to the NSW State Parliament as it launches its campaign against the State Government’s proposed cuts to WorkCover NSW.

The demonstration kicks off a combined television, radio, online and billboard advertisement blitz aimed at stopping the State Government from stemming the $4.1 billion deficit the body has accumulated.

Currently, a Parliamentary Inquiry is being held into the proposed changes to the NSW WokCover Scheme, and is due to report back on June 13.

Unions NSW Secretary Mark Lennon said Unions across the state were dedicated to vigorously defending the rights of injured workers.

“People who have been badly injured at work are among society’s most vulnerable,” Mr Lennon said. “These are people who just wanted to do their job, but whose lives were turned upside down due to a work-related injury.

The push by Unions NSW comes after State Minister for Finance and services Greg Pearce released the results of an analysis of WorkCover which indicated the scheme is currently unviable, and that more must be done to bring premiums more into line with other states, such as Queensland and Victoria.

The issues paper released by the State Government can be found here