Brian Baumhammer

Bachelor of Engineering (Mining Hons) Member of Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (AusIMM) Member PERHAPI (Indonesia)

Brian has more than 30 years’ experience in coal and metals operations across Australia and Indonesia in many different mining environments. Within this experience he has held a wide range of roles with a strong management and technical background. He has been responsible for managing mining engineering operations on sites including PT KPC, Mount Thorley-Warkworth, and HI’s Channar operations. His technical capabilities have been developed through his involvement in the development and management of mining contracts for large scale operations, the development of operational and logistical expansions of operations and strategic planning for development and successful operations.

Brian has worked as a consultant for 9 of the last 12 years. He has developed capabilities of Project Directorship and Project Management which have been used in Conceptual, Pre-Feasibility, Feasibility Studies and Technical Reviews associated with mine developments, Mergers and Acquisitions and Due Diligence evaluations. He is a ‘Competent Person’ as defined in the JORC Code and has experience as an ‘Independent Technical Expert’, having prepared or been participant in many Due Diligence and IPO reports of projects in Australian and Indonesian coal and metals operations.

Brian has been a member of the AusIMM for 34 years. Brian has presented a number of papers at seminars and coal mining conferences aimed at improving industry practice.

Geoff N. Pitkin

Bachelor of Engineering (Mining Hons 1)—Master of Business Administration—Member of Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (AusIMM) – Chartered Professional Mining Engineer, Member of the Mining Industry Consultants Association (MICA)

Geoff has 40 years' experience in the New South Wales and Queensland coal industries with a background in open cut and underground operations, new mine development and the preparation of feasibility studies. Geoff has worked as a consultant for the last 15 years. He has developed particular skills in the areas of dragline operations, the application of mining technologies, mineral economics and finance, software development, strategic planning and project management.

Geoff has managed and performed major feasibility and prefeasibility studies, strategic studies at both the corporate and business unit level, technical and due diligence reviews, financial studies and valuations, equipment comparisons and justifications, rehabilitation studies and short and long term planning. Geoff is also a Competent Person under the JORC Code.

Dean Sorley

Bachelor of Engineering (Mining Hons II) - Finsia Graduate Diploma of Applied Finance and Investment (current) - Member of Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (AusIMM) - Associate Member of FINSIA

Dean has some 21 years experience in the coal mining industry in both underground and open cut. He has been working in the Australian coal industry since 1993 in various rolls and in Mexico from 2008 as Chief Operating Officer in development of Palomas Mine for Alpha Prime Development Corp, China. Dean was responsible for exploration, business planning and mining operations.

Dean has detailed operational, technical and financial knowledge of open cut and underground, bypass and washery coal operations. He has project managed the development of Palomas underground mine in Mexico. Working as manager Hunter Valley for Minarco-MineConsult, he has performed mining studies including conceptual, pre-feasibility and feasibility studies, project valuation and due diligence on various operations. Dean is a competent user of many mining software packages and is also a competent person under the JORC Code.

Michael A Pitkin

Bachelor of Engineering - Master of Engineering (Mining Management) - Graduate Member of Australian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (AusIMM)

Michael is an experienced engineer with specialisations in mining engineering, mine design and software engineering. His software engineering experience covers software design, database design, data analysis, information retrieval, simulation and graphics. Michael has been involved in preparing mine designs, schedules, reserves and cost estimates for mining studies. These studies have included Drayton South (dragline open cut), Dartbrook (shovel/truck and crusher/conveyor open cut), Lake Lindsay (short term dragline design), and Yamala (open cut and underground longwall and pillar mining). His latest project has been the evaluation of a greenfields open cut mining operation including highwall mining technologies.

Michael has developed a truck simulation and short term scheduling system for Warkworth Mine and a database system to collect and manage personnel and equipment details for contracting companies. Michael has also developed the:

Michael is a proficient MINEX user with acQuire database experience. He specialises in data analysis and information recovery and has developed custom Excel data extraction for laboratory reports. He is proficient in the use of the following programming languages Visual Basic, Java, C, C#, SQL, VHDL and Visual Basic for Applications. He has designed databases in Access, Oracle, MS-SQL and My SQL.

James Leayr

Bachelor of Engineering (Mechanical) – Master of Engineering (Mining Management)

James is a Mechanical Engineer (Honours) with a Masters in Mine Management and previous engineering experience in the energy sector. James has been involved in completing several concept to feasibility level mining studies throughout the hunter valley, gaining medium-long term mine planning experience in the designing, reserving, scheduling, productivity analysis, equipment selection and costing stages of these studies. James has also assisted in the development/testing of in-house software packages and is a competent MINEX user.

Rod Hall

Bachelor of Science (Hons) Geology - Member of Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (AusIMM)

Rod has some 35 years industry experience and has been consulting to the coal industry for the last 5 years. He has held various positions as manager as well as being a director on a number of industry boards. These include The Cooperative Research Centre for Coal in Sustainable Development, The Cooperative Research Centre for Black Coal Utilisation and Chairman Mount Thorley Coal Loading Limited.

Rod has previously been Technical Marketing Manager, Product Manager and Safety Manager for Rio Tinto Coal (NSW) Pty Ltd, Manager Technical Services and Manager Projects for Novacoal Australia Pty Ltd and Manager Howick Coal Preparation Plant. As a consultant Rod has consulted on coal technical issues covering geology, exploration, sampling, analysis, mining processing and marketing. He has prepared guidelines for operations for a two stage coal preparation plant and prepared marketing information to effect a stronger position for clients.

Greg Mattila

Bachelor of Engineering (Electrical) - Master of Business Administration - Coal Mining Certificate – NSW Managers Certificate of Competency - Fellow of Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (AusIMM) – Fellow Institute of Materials, Minerals and Metallurgy, Member of the Mining Electrical and Mining Mechanical Engineering Society

Greg has over 40 years experience in the Australian and international mining industry, with a particular focus on underground black coal mines. He has provided independent consultancy services to the mining industry since 1988. He was the project manager, then project consultant for the Mandalong Mine, a large underground longwall mine near Morisset in NSW. Greg has also conducted a major review of underground coal mines in Mexico for the World Bank.

Most recent assignments have included mine valuations, due diligence assessments, project and strategic advice. Greg has also managed the preparation of development applications, environmental impact statements and bankable feasibility documents.

John L Edwards

Bachelor of Science (Geology) - Master of Applied Science (Mining Geomechanics)- Member of Australian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (AusIMM)

John has over 35 years experience in the coal and metalliferous mining industry. He was previously Chief Geologist with BHP Billiton’s operations in the Lake Macquarie area and has been consulting to the mining industry on geological matters since 2000. In that time he has undertaken the development, review and audit of geological risk management plans, developed and administered R&D management systems, coordinated geoscience data for mine design projects and undertaken extensive due diligence assessments in many countries. John is Past Chairman of the Coalfield Geology Council of NSW and an inaugural member of ACARP Underground Research Sub-Committee. John is also a Competent Person under the JORC Code.

Winton Gale

Managing Director Strata Control Technology Group (SCT) – Bachelor of Science – Doctor of Philosophy

SCT Group provides leading consulting and research service to the mining industries. SCT was established in 1989 and has established a reputation, both in Australia and internationally, for successfully delivering project services and innovative solutions that incorporate leading edge technology whilst being practical and effective.

SCT specialises in providing practical solutions to mining geotechnical and strata control problems. The instrumentation and numerical analysis techniques developed by the group have led to significant advances in the understanding and design of both rock reinforcement systems and the behaviour of excavations in complex stress fields.

SCT’s comprehensive understanding of strata behaviour, rock reinforcement, rock property and stress data, can provide design information for specific mining and strata control options for both existing and planned mining operations.

The team boasts a blend of experience and expertise in the specialisations necessary for generating a detailed mine plan for Drayton South.

Lynne Banwell

B.Sc (Geology). MAusIMM

Lynne is a geologist with more than 25 years experience, who has extensive experience in both the coal and metalliferous mining industries.

Lynne has been consulting to the industry since 1986 initially as Senior Geologist with Maptek Pty Limited for over ten years, and then as a Senior Consulting Geologist. Her special area of expertise is in using computer applications for resource analysis and modelling, particularly the Vulcan software package. She has held lead roles in many diverse projects including the preparation of geological models for both coal and metals deposits, JORC resources and reserves estimation, Mining Feasibility studies, Mine Planning, Geological Data analysis and Database design. Lynne is a Competent Person under the JORC Code.

Ronald J Findley

First Class Mine Managers Certificate of Competency, Cert. Coal Mining, Cert. Structural Engineering.

Ron has over 46 years in heavy industry of which over 30 have spent in the coal industry and 14 in shipbuilding. Ron worked at all levels of mining from face worker to Mine Manager. He has held senior mining positions in Powercoal, Xstrata, Coal Operations Australia and Centennial Coal including Mine Manager at Preston Colliery, Ivanhoe Colliery and Chain Valley Mine. Ron also held a position as NSW Government Mines Inspector during the 1990s. Ron has been consulting to the mining industry on safety, risk management and technical matters since 2002.

Robert Byrnes

Bachelor of Science (Geography/Botany), University of NSW. Graduate Diploma in Environmental Studies, Macquarie University, Chartered Biologist Member, Institute of Biology (UK); Member, Australian Institute of Biology

Robert has over 24 four years experience in the environmental assessment of mining developments, extractive industries, industrial proposals and public infrastructure projects. He has specialist skills in terrestrial ecosystem management, land rehabilitation, land use planning, design and implementation of Environmental Management Systems, community liaison and compliance auditing. Robert has many years of experience in project management of large multidisciplinary environmental studies for sensitive and controversial projects

David W Jones

Mechanical Engineer, Engineer-in-Charge Certificate.

David has over 38 years experience in the mining industry and his previous roles have included positions as Group Engineer for Coal and Allied and Chief Engineer for Coal Operations Australia. He progressed from a "hands-on" mechanical fitter role to positions where he controlled the engineering management of a group of mines where he built world-class mine mechanical and electrical engineering teams. He has considerable knowledge and experience of all engineering aspects of mining equipment and systems, particularly in relation to longwall and bord-and-pillar systems. He has taken significant leaderships roles in the development of equipment and maintenance standards and was active in the formulation of new coal mining Regulations. He currently acts as ACARP Project Review Committee member and monitor. David has been consulting to the mining industry on engineering management and equipment matters since 2002 and has co-authored several papers on engineering aspects of his work.