Managing closed mines for the long haul

Last updated: 14 January 2026 

Fernanda oversees a global team who manage geotechnical risks across our legacy and rehabilitation sites. With a team based across Australia, North America and Europe, Fernanda is responsible for managing tailings storage facilities, water dams, closed pits and waste dumps – anywhere geotechnical hazards persist.  

Originally from Brazil and trained as a civil engineer, her trajectory into tailings was accidental, but her passion for soil mechanics and complex problem-solving has made her a leading voice in responsible closure. Fernanda’s work is grounded in a belief that closure isn’t about just finishing operations and walking away after mining ends – it’s about mitigating and managing risks and designing for safety from the very start. 

“I love working on tailings projects. The challenges related to designing and managing tailings facilities go beyond pure soil mechanics. But I didn’t choose this discipline; I fell into it. 

When I first started working in tailings 13 years ago, I barely knew what tailings were. It’s not a subject that is traditionally part of an engineering course.  Even today, most of what we know about tailings, we learn on the job. 

But I quickly realised I loved it. Working with tailings is complex, and that complexity is what drew me in. You need to understand everything – process engineering, geotechnical stability, hydrogeology, environmental science – and then balance it all.  

And when it comes to mine closure, the challenge – and opportunity – lies in shaping mined land into areas that serve communities again, designed to be safe and enduring long after we leave the site.” 

GISTM: a mining industry game changer

“The Global Industry Standard on Tailings Management (GISTM) has changed how the mining industry thinks about tailings.  

When I started in mining, tailings were seen as a nuisance – just waste that had to be dealt with at the end of the process. But after 2 major dam failures causing major environmental disasters and loss of life in Brazil – at Samarco in 2015 and Brumadinho in 2019 – the mining industry was being held to account by investors and other partners to improve how we manage tailings risk.  

GISTM brought improved governance and assurance to tailings facilities, by setting transparent expectations for how companies should design, operate, monitor and close tailings facilities, and communicate with stakeholders. 

For my team, conformance with GISTM is something we aim for every day. We work across legacy and rehabilitation sites, support operational sites with technical reviews and risk workshops related to the tailings facilities, and help shape closure plans that meaningfully reduce long-term risks. 

One of the biggest shifts GISTM brought was integration. Before, different disciplines worked in their own silos, doing their part but rarely sharing ideas or working together. Now, we’re all collaborating regularly, and achieving much better solutions as a result. 

GISTM has given us a framework to manage tailings more responsibly, and we’re now expanding that same level of governance to water facilities too.” 

Balancing cost with responsibility

“One of the biggest misconceptions about closure is that after mining ends, the mining company packs up and hands a site over. But managing environmental and technical risk doesn't stop when mining at the site ends. 

Closure used to be an afterthought in mine design, something companies budgeted for with a vague line item and no real plan until it was time to shut down operations. But the industry’s approach is changing. Planning properly for closure can help us more effectively manage the risks – financial, environmental and human.  

To achieve better closure outcomes, we’re now embedding closure into how we design our operations from the start. The Winu project is a great example – it’s a new copper-gold project in Western Australia. Our teams there are consulting with Traditional Owners to understand their needs and with regulators to ensure we design positive closure outcomes from day one. My team contributes to this planning – we join risk workshops, review plans and provide input, even though closure won’t begin at Winu for many decades.  

I hope we can help people see that the most promising way to achieve a safe and successful closure is to plan for it from conception. This sets the foundation for managing tailings risks and the long-term safety and integrity of our geotechnical assets after closure.”