BHP Billiton’s stewardship journey began shortly after the opening of its Cannington operation in Queensland, which mines silver, zinc and lead. At the time, Mick Roche was Cannington’s Manager Safety, Environment and External Affairs. “We built Cannington to the highest standard possible in every aspect, from health and safety to engineering to storage – and we were quite proud of that,” says Roche. “At every stage of the process – from the mine to transport to storage – the product never came into contact with people or the environment. It never saw the light of day.”

That level of care was paramount in the new operation, especially with lead being such a toxic product. “At the time, we were about to become the world’s largest single mine producer of silver and lead,” says Roche. “Then I went overseas and saw how some of our customers were handling the same product. I was surprised that they weren’t necessarily taking the same level of care as we were. 

“We took the view that it was still our product and we had to share responsibility for it. So that began our crusade to introduce stewardship principles to lead as a commodity.” The result is the Green Lead Project, spearheaded by BHP Billiton and more than 20 stakeholders involved with supply, production, recycling and use of lead. This consortium includes smelters, customers, government, NGOs, battery manufacturers and recyclers.

“We looked at the life cycle of lead and set up a group of all the players,” says Roche. “It took us till 2001 to build the consortium and each of the players recognise they have a shared responsibility for the product.”

Collaboration essential across supply chain

Roche emphasises this collaborative approach is vital for stewardship to truly work over any product’s life cycle.  “Stewardship doesn’t happen if only one company is involved,” he says. “It has to be a shared approach. Now that we have built the consortium, we are developing the standards."

An assessment tool is already being trialled at various sites around the world, including Cannington, and Roche expects the Green Lead Project’s standards will come into effect in 2007.

One of the challenges of the initiative has been to encourage and facilitate dialogue between all the stakeholders. “It’s challenging to bring together all the different sectors involved with the product,” says Roche.  “That involves a combination of people who don’t traditionally sit around the table.“

The constant message I hear from the players involved is that this is first time they’ve worked together and shared responsibility in this way. As a result, they learn so much more about all the other sectors in the process. It’s not one sector telling another sector what to do – we’ve all done it together.”

Using the Green Lead Project as a model, Roche says BHP Billiton began applying the same concept to its other commodities. “First you look at what you need to do,” says Roche, who became BHP Billiton’s Manager of Product Stewardship in 2004. “Not all commodities will need a consortium to move forward.We’re in the process of developing standards and stewardship principles across the board.”

Four main types of stewardship

Roche says there are four main types of stewardship:material stewardship; product stewardship; resource stewardship and process stewardship.

“With material stewardship, we’re looking at the inputs into the life cycle – such as water and energy,” says Roche.  He points to BHP Billiton’s Mount Arthur Coal which is using town effluent for coal processing. About 90% of the town’s total effluent is used.

Product stewardship takes a whole-of-life view of products at different stages of its life cycle – such as the Green Lead Project.

Resource stewardship is maximising the value of the resources for current and future generations. Roche refers to the Last Drop initiative at the company’s Peak Downs Mine, which aims to minimise coal loss and maximise coal utilisation in the mining process. “We’re extracting all the coal we can possibly extract from the open pit mines, otherwise it would just stay there and be buried and wasted,” says Roche. 

Process stewardship ensures that by-products are not wasted. In 2002, Curtin University of Technology studied the by-products of various operations in the Kwinana area in Western Australia. “At our nickel operation In Kwinana, one of the by-products is ammonium sulphate. Instead of just dumping the waste material, it now gets sold to the fertiliser company next door,” says Roche. “Similarly, another waste product is lime – which develops as a result of a water purification process. Instead of having it stockpiled, we sell that to the nearby cement works. Curtin looked at all the inputs and outputs of industries in the area and came up with a fairly complicated spaghetti diagram where you could see that one company’s waste output could be another company’s process input.

“You need to start with a blank sheet of paper with any stewardship concept,” he says. “Ask yourself: ‘How are we going to deal with this commodity?’ It’s also important to remember that stewardship in itself is not a surrogate for sustainable development – but it is an integral part of it.  Applying the underlying core principles of sustainable development and putting it under the stewardship model enables people to understand where they fit in.We are all part of a simple life cycle and we all need to be responsible.”

HP Billiton sustainability report:
http://sustainability.bhpbilliton.com/2006/