Risk Assessment

Through in-depth understanding of the mining value chain Optiro can analyse the risks that can affect your mining project, and how to mitigate these.  Our consultants use leading edge tools for quantifying and qualifying risk, and numerically integrate these into a holistic project risk profile.  Furthermore, we help you to understand your risk appetite and how this will guide your decision.

There is significant risk associated with every link in the mining value chain.  The exposure to the risk varies as do the consequences of realising/not realising the risk.  The third variable is the likelihood of the risk being realised.  

Holistic – whole-of-project-risk assessment allows you to be better informed, especially when making a choice between two seemingly unenviable or intractable alternatives. To optimise your project, as a precursor it is essential to know where your current risks lie, your potential exposure to those risks, and the likelihood and impact of those risks.

Holistic risk assessment assesses the whole of your project.  Risks are associated with every aspect, such as exchange rate, commodity price, market demand, social and environmental risks, technological uncertainty, equipment and consumable supply risks, nature of the mineralisation, the grade and the rock strength, climatic conditions and the hydrological environment are evaluated in unison.

Techniques to numerically quantify the risks include modern asset pricing and stochastic forecasting, probabilistic geotechnical modelling, pit-to-port simulation, conditional simulation for grade and geometallurgical variables, and so on.  However, every risk variable affecting projects should not be quantified in this way – for many, more qualitative risk assessment techniques, including expert opinion, benchmarking or workshopping need to be used.

Optiro uses a process to integrate all sources of risk into a holistic project risk profile.  A key skill is to weight the various risk causes to provide a valid and sensible outcome that acknowledges differing uncertainty and relative importance of variables.  
The result is a meaningful risk profile which can be used for project-to-project comparisons.

Once risk is quantified or qualified Optiro can match the risk profile with your appetite for risk.  This appetite may cause you to be a risk embracer or risk averse.  It is essential to understand the very close interrelationship of the project risk profile and your particular risk appetite before making any major decisions.