October 27, 2017: Invited Speaker Seminar: Operations Research in Mining: Past, Present and Future

Dr. José Saavedra-Rosas
University of Chile

Friday, October 27, 2017 at 11:00 am
Room EV003.309

Abstract

This talk reviews some of the presenter's contributions to operations research modelling applied to mining problems. The talk will provide an overview of past contributions, some work currently being developed and finally discuss some open problems that the presenter expects to study in the future and that he considers to be of a challenging nature. Due to time constraints, the talk will briefly touch on some of the contributions but otherwise will discuss a couple of them in detail to give the attendees a better idea of the nature of the problems. The talk will attempt to introduce the attendees to the general problem of mining, provide an overview of the classical models used and provide food for thought for anyone that may become interested in this application area.

Biography

Dr. José Saavedra-Rosas is an Adjunct Professor at both the Mining Department, Faculty of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, University of Chile, Santiago, Chile and the Department of Mineral and Energy Economics, Curtin University, Perth, Western Australia. He is also Chief Data Scientist at Coalesce Group and Feedmee App both located in Perth, Western Australia. Dr. Saavedra-Rosas holds a PhD in Natural Resources Engineering from Laurentian, University, Sudbury, Ontario, Canada, an MSc in Operations Management from University of Chile and a Mathematical Engineering degree from the University of Chile. Dr. Saavedra-Rosas is the current Academic Director of the Mineral Economics Postgraduate program in the Mining Department at the University of Chile. Previously, Dr. Saavedra-Rosas was a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Mineral and Energy Economics at Curtin University and also at the Western Australian School of Mines at Curtin University. His recent teaching responsibilities have included units as diverse as Econometrics and Forecasting, Resource Cost and Capital, Risk and Decisions in Mining, Resource Estimation, Mine Planning and Operations Research. His research interests are centered around the application of Operations Research methods and techniques in natural resource problems with past emphasis on mining and recent focus on renewables such as rubber and in particular supply chain management and simulation.