Expert panellists
Professor Andrew Hopkins – Emeritus Professor of Sociology, Australian National University
Professor Hopkins is an Emeritus Professor of Sociology at the Australian National University in Canberra. He was a consultant to the US Chemical Safety Board in its investigation of the Texas City accident. His book on that accident was titled Failure to Learn: the BP Texas City Refinery Disaster.
Andrew was later a consultant to the Board for its investigation of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill disaster and has written a book on that subject: Disastrous Decisions: The Human and Organisational Causes of the Gulf of Mexico Blowout. In total, he has written some 15 books with more than 90,000 copies sold. In 2008 he won the European Process Safety Centre award and in 2016 he was made an honorary fellow of the Institution of Chemical Engineers in recognition of his “outstanding contributions to process safety and to the analysis of process safety related incidents”. His current research interests are in responses to climate change.
Dr Angela Küpper – Director and Principal Geotechnical Engineer, BGC Engineering Inc.
Dr Küpper has 40 years of experience in design, construction, rehabilitation of tailings and water retention dams. She has been involved as a designer, engineer-of-record, expert consultant and independent reviewer in all phases of the lifecycle of tailings facilities in a variety of projects in North America, South America, Africa and Asia.
Angela has experience with a number of independent review boards and has participated in various professional and industry-wide initiatives including two terms as Vice President Technical of the Canadian Geotechnical Society, member of a committee for updating the Canadian Dam Safety Guidelines (2005-06), co-chairing the committee that developed the guidance document on delicensing of oil sands dams, Canlex (Canadian Liquefaction Experiment) and others. Angela was the 2019 Distinguished Lecturer, Geological Engineering, University of British Columbia, Canada speaking on Tailings Dams and the 2011 Distinguished Lecturer of the American Society of Civil Engineers/University of California, Berkeley, USA on the Design and Performance of Earthfill Dams. She was a keynote speaker at the International Tailings and Mine Waste Conference in 2013. Angela has received several awards including the Alberta Government (Canada) Innovation Award for the rehabilitation of Travers Dam.
Professor Deanna Kemp – Sustainable Minerals Institute (SMI), The University of Queensland
As Director of the Centre for Social Responsibility in Mining (CSRM) at the SMI, Professor Kemp leads an international program of work enabling a team of more than 30 applied social researchers working across a global portfolio of projects. Her own research focuses on company-community conflict; displacement and resettlement; business and human rights; and how the global mining industry is organised, resourced and incentivised to respond to these challenges. She engages industry, government, civil society groups, and mine-affected communities in her teaching and research, and has participated in numerous independent panels and inquiries.
Deanna currently serves on the Board of Trustees for the Institute for Human Rights and Business (IHRB) and the New Member Review Panel for the International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM). She is a member of the International Association of Impact Assessment (IAIA) and the International Network of Displacement and Resettlement (INDR). Prior to joining the university ten years ago, Deanna worked within the mining industry, in both corporate and site-based social performance roles.
Professor Dirk Van Zyl – University of British Colombia
Dirk Van Zyl is a professor and Chair of Mining and the Environment at the Norman B. Keevil Institute of Mining Engineering, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC. Dirk has more than 35 years experience in research, teaching and consulting in tailings and mine waste rock disposal and heap leach design. During the last decade much of his attention has been focused on mining and sustainable development and mine life cycle management.
Professor Zyl has more than 100 publications to his credit and presented numerous short courses on heap leach design, mining environmental management and mine closure in the US and abroad. He is the recipient of the three awards from the Society for Mining, Metallurgy and Exploration (SME) and received the Bureau of Land Management Sustainable Development award in 2005 and the Adrian Smith International Environmental Mining Award in 2006.
Karen Nash – Senior Associate, Behre Dolbear; Director, Environmental & Social Performance, MDS Mining & Environmental Services
Karen Nash is a versatile and proven environmental consultant, published biodiversity field researcher, lecturer and teacher. She has a breadth of specialist experience since 1994 in strategic and project-based environmental and social consulting across sectors – predominantly mining, oil & gas, renewables, coastal & marine and infrastructure developments – and in various countries both north and south of the Equator.
Bilingual in French/English with a working knowledge of Spanish, Portuguese and German, and with additional postgraduate qualifications in law, environmental economics, and teaching, she works in both strategic research and solution-oriented roles. Her focus is on helping companies to recognise, understand and manage the interplay between legal, environmental, social, and organisational constraints, as well as engaging with the fundamental, long-term requirements of environmental conservation and sustainability. In this context, she can carry out social and environmental impact assessment (EIA and ESIA), work on the consultative preparation of environmental and social management plans (ESMPs and Community Development planning), interpret and analyse environmental and social policy, legislation and guidelines, and develop and deliver knowledge transfer, training and capacity-building.
Professor Mark Squillace – University of Colorado Law School
Professor Squillace joined the faculty at the University of Colorado Law School in 2005 where he served as the Director of the Natural Resources Law Center until 2013. He has also taught at the University of Wyoming College of Law, and at Wyoming he served a three-year term as the Winston S. Howard Professor of Law. In 2000, Professor Squillace took a leave from law teaching to serve as Special Assistant to the Solicitor at the U.S. Department of the Interior. In that capacity he worked directly with the Secretary of the Interior, Bruce Babbitt, on a wide range of legal and policy issues.
Susan Joyce – President, On Common Ground Consultants
Susan Joyce is a Sociologist with 25 years of experience working with companies, communities, and financial institutions to identify and manage social and human rights risks for resource and development projects. She has worked extensively assisting companies to meet and exceed international standards in social performance and human rights due diligence, and developing effective on-the ground strategies for reducing risk and enhancing social value. Her professional expertise includes strategic social assessment, ESG compliance reviews and advisory support, stakeholder engagement, human rights due diligence and impact/risk assessments, indigenous issues, corporate and operational capacity building and international best practice in management of social impacts and benefits.