AMC at Mines & Money 2021

James McFarlane

Technical & Operations Director

James holds a MSc from the Camborne School of Mines in Mining Geology and has worked as both a production and exploration geologist in the UK, Ireland and Australia, and as a principal mining consultant across a range of commodities globally. He was formerly Mining Technical Services Manager at Hemerdon under Wolf Minerals.

Ian Lipton

Principal Geometallurgist

Ian has 40+ years of experience in mining geology, resource evaluation, geometallurgy, and exploration, covering a wide range of commodities and mining operations. He has been promoting geometallurgy for project improvement for 20 years and has been involved in a variety of geometallurgical projects.

As Global Practice Leader for Geometallurgy, Ian is responsible for designing and managing geometallurgical studies to reduce risk and improve outcomes in feasibility studies and operating mines. Ian is the author of a variety of technical papers on resource estimation, density, mining geology, and geometallurgy. He has presented Mine Geology and Grade Control and Geometallurgy training courses to professionals in Australia, Sweden, Tanzania, Brazil, and Indonesia.

Michelle Helm

Principal Geometallurgist

Michelle is a geometallurgist and metallurgist with 19 years’ experience in the mining industry. With experience spanning consulting, technical, research & development and operational roles, Michelle brings deep orebody knowledge and process understanding together from multiple disciplines to drive geometallurgical insights that deliver improved project performance and value. When combined with her mining reconciliation experience, Michelle’s domain knowledge ensures the most appropriate geometallurgical parameters are defined, and continually assessed. Her experience covers a range of commodities including gold, copper, iron ore, nickel, mineral sands and rare earth minerals. Michelle is an authority on the characterization of carbonaceous gold ores and the downstream impact on gold ore processing, and the author of several technical papers on this subject. 

Nicholas Szebor 

General Manager, Maidenhead

Nick has 14 years of experience within the mineral industry working in roles including consultancy and production. His experience covers a range of commodities, geological settings, exploration and production environments, including underground and open-pit operations. This experience has been obtained across the mining lifecycle from early-stage exploration to production and mine closure. Nick has carried out mineral resource estimates to international reporting codes including JORC, CIM (NI 43-101), and SAMREC.

Nigel Walls

Principal Mining Engineer

Nigel is a Chartered Mining Engineer with some 34 years of international experience in operations, due diligence, project evaluation, operational readiness, feasibility studies, and technical auditing. He has several years of experience developing mineral projects through various stages of studies to FEED, detailed engineering and implementation, and always with an emphasis on the financial return of a project rather than just production. Nigel has a strong entrepreneurial background having previously owned his own mines and contracting company.

Narina Shorland

Senior Mining Engineer

Andrew Narina’s has nine years' experience in mining consultancy and a year at an open-pit tungsten mine. Her primary expertise is in all aspects of mine design, long-term and short-term planning and optimization, equipment selection and evaluation of Ore Reserves in accordance with the JORC code (2012). Prior to joining AMC, Narina worked for Wolf Minerals in the UK as a mining engineer. Prior to Wolf Minerals, Narina worked as a mining engineer at the Wardell Armstrong International consultancy, where she was involved in a wide range of projects, starting from scoping- to feasibilitylevel studies.

Johnny Mercer-Royce

Senior Mining Analyst

Johnny is a Senior Mining Analyst with eight years’ experience in the mining industry and two years’ experience in management consultancy. With experience across both underground and open pit Johnny’s key skills include financial analysis, market/industry analysis, and business improvement. These skills are all supported by technical experience in underground production engineering. Johnny’s experience in gold mining is split across engineering and business analysis with time spent in underground operations for St Barbara as well as business analysis for Eastern Goldfields.

“Perilya operates two underground lead/zinc/silver mines in Broken Hill (NSW Australia). Southern Operations is a remnant operation targeting 1.5Mt per annum of ore. Potosi Operation is a brownfield operation targeting 0.4Mt per annum of ore.

In the period from 2008 to 2012, AMC Consultants annually reviewed the estimation of the Mineral Resource and Ore Reserve for Perilya’s Broken Hill Operations.

AMC’s scope was to provide an independent technical review of the Mineral Resource an Ore Reserve in terms of data quality, process, methodology and with a view to identifying any significant concerns or risks. To meet the scope, AMC engaged with site personnel during the estimation process to ensure that there would be no unresolved issues at the time of public reporting and that the estimates would be reportable in accordance with the JORC Code. Issues identified during the reviews were addressed during the process and recommendations for improvements were implemented in subsequent years.

AMC provided constructive input to the estimation process and assisted site personnel in their roles as competent persons.

AMC’s role was acknowledged in the public reporting of Perilya’s Mineral Resource and Ore Reserve. Perilya found AMC to be professional, competent, and thorough in the provision of this service.”

Justin Woodward – Mine Planning Superintendent, Perilya Broken Hill Limited

“I had twice the opportunity to work with the AMC Mining Consultants Ltd. performing technical audits of our mining operations in Chile.

It is of great advantage to Anglo American that the AMC Mining Consultants Ltd. has a wide range of mining expertise from exploration and evaluation of mineral resources through mine planning, mining schedule optimization to geotechnical assessments in both operational environments: open cast and underground mining.

Indeed, the AMC group met our expectations carrying out its work diligently, with enthusiasm and technical excellence. In the execution of works, the company AMC was exceeding our expectation — proposing solutions and assessing us with eagerness and commitment. The objectives and deadlines were always achieved.”

Tomasz Wawruch – Mineral Resources Manager, Copper Division of Anglo American in Santiago, Chile