Service Awards

Ross Welsh

Ross started his career in 1963 as a Trainee Chemist with ACIRL in Ipswich working with Arthur LePage, Bruce Proudfoot and John Woolard. After completing an Industrial Chemistry course at QIT he transferred in late 1969 to the new ACIRL Laboratory and Pilot Preparation Plant in Rockhampton as Deputy Manager working with Dick Dunstone who was appointed Manager in 1970. During this time, the ACIRL facilities in Ipswich and Rockhampton were the major commercial laboratories in Queensland to treat the ever increasing number of borecores and bulk samples from the developing Bowen Basin Coalfield.

He attended the inaugural meeting of the Queensland Branch of the ACPS in January 1967 held at the Ipswich Bowls Club and has been a Member of the Society since then. Ross first joined the QLD Branch Committee in 1982 and continued until 2002. Ross was on the National Board in 1990 and 1991 and then again from 2000 to 2002. He was also on the LOC for the 9th ACPS Conference which was held in Yeppoon in 2002.

Ross also co-ordinated many of the early CQ One-Day Symposia starting back in 1996 in Dysart and then in Emerald from 1997. He was instrumental in growing the CQ membership in the late 1990’w and early 2000’s and would personally call the majority of the plant managers and megallurgists in CQ to ensure that they were attending or sending people to the various technical meetings and other Society gatherings.

In 1974, Ross accepted the position of Chief Chemist at Utah Development Company’s Saraji Mine. First coal was railed in September that year. His role was later expanded to include the position of Environmental Officer

The commercial world beckoned and Ross accepted a position with SGS in 1984, firstly as Manager of the Gladstone Laboratory and later as Queensland Operations Manager with responsibility for the superintending and exploration business for both the Mackay and Gladstone Facilities.

Ross returned to ACIRL in 1989 as Manager of the Rockhampton facility. Not long after that, ACIRL underwent a corporate restructure which saw the closure of the Rockhampton, Bellambi and North Ryde facilities and the expansion of the Maitland and Ipswich sites. He then took on the role of Business Development for ACIRL in Queensland working out of a Rockhampton Office and was responsible for the establishment of the Emerald Laboratory in 1991 and later the expansion of laboratory services at Moranbah and Blackwater. He was also involved in the in the establishment and commissioning of the ACTEST laboratories in Mackay and Gladstone.

Ross left ACIRL in 2001 to pursue a business opportunity which went nowhere fast (always listen to your wife – they do know more than you}. Anyway, later, after becoming creative in concrete technology, Ross made a foray into making and selling garden ornaments as well operating his own consulting business until the lure of coal again beckoned and he joined son Duncan in expanding and supporting his coal testing business; Preplab Testing Services in Rockhampton and later a Gladstone Operation.

Most of you know Ross Welsh as the guy who ran the QLD General Coal Preparation Course which he ran from 1998 up until 2011. The courses became legendary, starting with only one course per year it soon became apparent that there was a great need for these courses as our industry began to expand and the knowledge and understanding of coal preparation principals were in demand. Ross was soon running up to 9 courses a year predominantly in Rockhampton but also in Brisbane. These courses have delivered unmeasurable value to our industry and each and every course would get a range of people from plant operators, process engineers, equipment suppliers and even geologists and mining engineers. All of these participants were seeking to enhance their general coal preparation knowledge and the platform provided by the Society and delivered by Ross Welsh and his band of merry lecturers has ensured that the ACPS is seen as one of the premier providers of coal preparation training throughout the world.

Moving into retirement mode in 2015, Ross can now spend more time with his hobby – a keen interest in Model Steam Trains (5 inch gauge). Coal fired of course!!

Dick Sanders

The contributions of Dick Sanders to the Coal Preparation Society are probably unsurpassed for someone who was never a member of any state or national committee – he was always keen to be involved, but has worked in a number of companies in which his close colleagues were members of the committee already. While many people will know Dick for his wit and wisdom at meetings and conferences, and for his ability to extract amazing conclusions from coal quality information, the full extent of his contributions is not well known.

Dick was involved in one of the pivotal events in the development of the Australian Coal Preparation Society – the running of the First Australian Coal Preparation Conference in Newcastle , 1981. He was part of the local organising committee that set the bench mark for all the conferences that followed, with 300 delegates registered and many turned away.

After obtaining a Metallurgy Certificate and working in physical testing of metal products, he began his involvement in the coal industry through bore core evaluation, which led to him undertaking a B.Sc. (Geology). In summary his career has encompassed:

1958-63: John Lysaght (Aust) Pty Ltd as a Trainee, Senior Shift Tester and Quality Control Officer.
1964-65: BHP Central Research Laboratories as a Technical Officer in the Metallurgy Section.
1965-70: BHP Central Research Laboratories as a Senior Technical Officer working on the development of Auscoke, a novel cokemaking technique, and then in the Coal Bore Core Evaluation Group.
1970-71: Project Mining Corporation as a Geologist evaluating the Mawson deposit near Swansea.
1972-77: as Senior Chemist (Manager) of the Maitland Laboratory and pilot washing facility.
1977-82: Peko Wallsend Limited, Coal Division, running the fuel utilisation group that covered coal testing, coal blending and technical support to marketing.
1983 – 87: Australian Coal Industry Research Laboratories (ACIRL) as Superintendent- Laboratory Services responsible for five laboratories around.
1987 – present: QCC (Quality Coal Consulting, later QCC Resources) as company founder, director and Executive Consultant.

QCC has grown and developed over the last twenty years to become one of the most highly regarded coal consulting groups and providers of CHPP design and engineering services. This in itself is a remarkable achievement because in 1987 the services sector for the coal industry was only in its infancy, placing QCC as one of the pioneers.

The contributions that Dick has made to the industry in general include:

worked with Arthur le Page on some of the early wet pretreatment work that was the forerunner of today’s techniques that are fundamental to reliable plant design
carried out pilot plant trials of many types of equipment and coal types in his stint at ACIRL Maitland
in the early 1970s contributed to the development of blending techniques at the Port of Newcastle being part of the original push to improve sampling in the Port of Newcastle and was a co-founder of ‘The Port of Newcastle Sampling Study Group’
the recognition of being a leading coal quality expert in working with Ken Preston to recognize the importance of in situ moisture and density in assessing coal reserves, with the Preston & Sanders formula now part of recognised procedures in this area
carrying out many ACARP R&D projects on coal quality and washability contributions to many Australian Standards, including the landmark guide to the use of bore cores in the assessment of coal deposits (AS2519) National Association of Testing Authorities (NATA) director and assessor Mines Rescue work; trained from 1973-84.

Some of Dick’s specific Society involvements include:

Being a member for over 30 years
Lecturing at innumerable introductory and advanced courses (even when one was not paid)
Writing the coal quality chapter for the Advanced Monograph Series
Contributing many papers to ACPS meetings, seminars and conferences, plus International Coal Preparation Congresses
Being on the local organising committee for the First Australian Coal Preparation Conference

Dave Ricketts

At the Southern Queensland Chairman’s Dinner Dave Ricketts’ considerable contribution to the Australian Coal Preparation Society and to the industry as a whole was recognized with the presentation of the ACPS Service Award by Queensland Chairman Matt Allen.

A brief timeline of Dave’s involvement within the industry follows:

1971 Dave arrived in Australia
1974 Met Sylvia
1986 Joined CMI and worked for John Dibley and Tom Fairhall
1989 Ludowici amalgamation and Dave managed the NSW Office for 5 years, working with Terry kingdom and Shane McLoughlin
1994 Moved to Brisbane
2006 Dave and Sylvia moved to Charlton West Virginia to open a Ludowici Branch where they stayed for three and a half years
2010 Brief stint with McLanahans then back to Ludowici (which was taken over by FLSmidth). A considerable amount of overseas travel followed for FLSmidth with stints in Johannesburg and Salt Lake City
2014 Dave retired in July

Dave’s involvement with the ACPS began in:

1986 Became a member of the Society
1992 Attended the Advanced Course in Kurri Kurri
2011-2013 Member of the Queensland Committee
2012-2013 Member of ACPS Board as Education Director

During this time Dave with Ludowici made a considerable contribution to the Society sponsoring numerous events. The ‘Golf Days’ were something that he especially enjoyed being involved with.

Dave is a well known and well respected person within the ACPS and throughout the industry as a whole. He is a good person and a good friend. It was a privilege to speak about Dave prior to the presentation of his award. Congratulations Dave and best wishes for a well earned, long retirement.

Ted Pickering

Ted Pickering was an outstanding coal preparation engineer and worked with enthusiasm, technical ingenuity, organising ability and integrity. Jim Donnelly introduced Ted to the ACPS members at the Kirribilli Club, November 2004. Ted commenced work as a trainee at BHP Coke Ovens and Coal Preparation Departments in the 1950’s and had an eventful and successful career in the coal industry and later in State Parliament.

In 1959 Ted worked on the upgrading of the BHP Steelworks CPP commissioning the Deister Table and Flotation Plant built by RBLong. The operational problems with this plant are the stuff of legend. But despite all the difficulties, the commissioning staff maintained feed to the coke ovens. A major difficulty was the fine coal system flotation, product thickening and filtration, which was fouled with ultra fines slimes. In those days the only fine particle coagulants used were starches and these proved ineffective. Ted was the first coal preparation engineer in this country to experiment with poly acrylamide flocculants. He succeeded in cleaning up the recirculating water and getting the flotation cells, fine coal thickener and the vacuum disk filters to work and in so doing averted a coke ovens disaster.

The BHP froth flotation plant was the first coal flotation plant in Australia and creosote was employed as a flotation reagent with mediocre results. Ted experimented with and adopted the frother reagent, methyl isobutyl carbinol, achieving considerable improvements in fine coal yield.

In 1965 he moved to the Bellambi Coal Company as coal preparation and coke ovens engineer and in his early twenties succeeded Rex Sandercock as Bellambi Coal Preparation Manager. Ted then worked with Jim in the dense medium cyclone installation at Bellambi, pitching in and helping at all hours of the day to bring the installation of the new technology to a successful conclusion.

Ted made significant contributions to the coal preparation industry. He was the first to employ a solid bowl centrifuge in a coal preparation plant for dewatering thickened tailings at Coal Cliff CPP. His expertise gained in flocculation research was utilised in successfully making a solid bowl centrifuge perform an operation which tested the limits of its capabilities. Coal Cliff was able to de-water and mix tailings with coarse rejects used in land fill, dispensing with the previous practice of pumping tailings slurry out to sea. He presented a landmark paper to the Society on this important breakthrough.

Coming from a family heavily involved in local government politics, his ideologies led to his becoming a member of the Legislative Council of the NSW Parliament in 1976. He not only worked diligently in this role but continued to manage the Coal Cliff CPP. Due to his drive to contribute to the welfare of the coal preparation industry he joined the Committee of the Society where he contributed his talent, advice and influence to the considerable benefit of the Society. Pressures of Parliamentary duties led him to resign from Coal Cliff but maintain a part time coal preparation consultancy, his most noteworthy contribution being the process design for the new three stage Mt Thorley CPP, the first fully computer controlled CPP in Australia.

Ted attended the International Coal Preparation Conference in Donetsk, Ukraine in 1979. His reputation as an anti socialist politician had preceded him and he was a person of interest to the KGB in Russia. Ted outlined many off the record anecdotes to the members present. Ted and his lovely wife Elaine have mutually supported each other and enjoyed life through his colourful career.

Peter Newling

Peter started working in the Mining Industry in particular the Coal Processing Industry in 1981 after having previously worked in the steel making industry at Newcastle and South Africa following his graduation from Newcastle University as a Chemical Engineer.

He entered the industry in 1981 at Hunter Valley Coal Preparation Plant as the Prep Plant Superintendent, as the plant was being constructed and he subsequently moved into the operational role.

In 1989, Peter left Hunter Valley Coal Preparation Plant to take up the role of Manager at Wollondilly Coal Preparation Plant through to 1995, he was then appointed as Manager of the new coal preparation plant at Stratford, this position he held until 1998.

1998 saw Peter at Catherine Hill Coal Preparation Plant again as Manager through to its closure in 2002. With the closure of this plant Peter began his Consultancy Business.

Through his consultancy Peter has worked in South Africa, Vietnam, China, Indonesia, New Zealand, Western Australia, Queensland, New South Wales and Tasmania.

His association with ACARP, the Industry research organization has been ongoing – initially as an industry representative and now as a research coordinator. This current role gives him a wide ranging responsibility to introduce technical reports produced into the industry by way of personal contact with operations personnel through seminars and plant visits.

He has been involved with most sections of the industry, representing many mining houses involved in the design, management, process auditing, and equipment selection in new and operating coal processing plants he has accepted the challenges that both the old and the new plants bring, with a common goal of maximizing the resource by ensuring that the process efficiencies of the preparation plants addresses world class techniques, equipment and practices, by their process design, layout and maintainability, along with being the ACARP Research Coordinator for Coal Preparation throughout Australia and an active participant with The Australian Coal Preparation Society including being a NSW Branch Chairman.

Peter’s contribution to the industry has been ongoing and his focus has always been on efficiency, maintainability, and operability of coal processing plants. I will highlight some of his achievements by mentioning the following;

Better use of improved wear materials, by improving the wear ability of water washing cyclones by researching the use of high quality ceramics – the type of ceramics that are used in prosthesis into the water washing cyclones highest wear component the spigot, and successfully managing its use.
Improving the reliability of plant items by introducing use of lever link motor mounts on the Decanter Centrifuges to overcome the chronic problem that they had by constantly throwing the drive vee belts.
Introduced the Teeter Bed as a piece of equipment into the industry that improved the recovery of ultra-fine coal.
Introduced reporting systems that allowed management to better review the plants performance.
Managed complex industrial issues within the industry as it has changed from a multi union based labour force with fixed roles to a flexible multi skilled single union work force during his time in the industry.
Successful management of the maritime unions and their severe industrial relations in his role as manager of the colliery vessel operating to and from Newcastle!

Peter’s view of successfully running a coal preparation plant has had a common theme, “you can have the best plant in the world, but it’s all about looking after the people and the politics” he has been proactive in utilizing whatever resources he could to train and inform the plant operators in the science of coal preparation so that they can make the decisions on how best to operate their plant, and he has used the Coal Preparation Society and ACARP to assist in this role.

Ultimately it’s the little people that determine the success of failure of an operation, and in this field of work Peter has excelled with his unique brand of people skills.

Les Liesfield

Les started in 1963 as an apprentice fitter and turner at the Long Reach Power Station. In 1968 he entered the coal industry as a fitter operator at the Moura Coal Preparation Plant and remained there for 14 years. In this period he became Leading Hand then Shift Foreman. In 1982 Les joined Ulan Washery as a Shift Supervisor and became Manager in 1991. At the end of 1994 he joined the Ulan Coal Mines Safety Department as a Superintendent.

Les retired in 2001 but was coaxed out of retirement and joined Charbon Colliery as Safety Officer for another 2 years.

Les attended his first Coal Preparation Course in Queensland in 1978 then the NSW Course in 1982. He became a member of the NSW Branch of the Society in 1982 and in 1990 was elected to the Committee and became the Western Region Representative.

In 1995 Les was the Conference Chairman of the National Coal Preparation Conference in Mudgee. In his ‘spare time’ Les was and is a dedicated member of the Lions Club. He also converted his love of older cars into doing up a 1970’s model Holden and participating in several round Australia rallies for The Kidney Foundation.

We wish him and his wife Lee a long and happy retirement.