At midnight on 15 December WST, we launch our new look website, new name and Job Board. This week, the team has been meeting with employers like Woodside, Santos, Clough, CiticPacific Mining, BHP Billiton, HWE, Monadelphous, United Group Resources and Leighton’s – all of whom will feature jobs and blogs on the site at the time of launch. This means we haven't been able to blog this week.

Off the back of the Gorgon Project start this week, Chevron also announced its $90b deal to supply gas to the Japanese from its Wheatstone Project near Onslow in Western Australia. The announcement promoted WA Premier to predict that Western Australia will be the world’s second biggest producer of LNG within 11 years.

One of the biggest casualties of the economic downturn this year was Windimurra’s Vanadium Project, which was halted when the company went into receivership in February.

A consortium led by Mineral Resources has just secured a deal with receivers to re-capitalise the Project. Mineral Resources has entered into a heads of agreement with receiver KordaMentha under which its consortium will take a majority stake in the company, with the group’s secured lenders taking a minority stake.

The University of Melbourne has introduced a Master of Mining Engineering (MEE) course, specifically designed to attract qualified engineers from other engineering disciplines into the mining industry, and to help fill the void created by the continuing high demand for mining engineering graduates. This innovative program opens a new path for engineers with non-mining backgrounds to move into the mining industry.

A recent AUSIMM article talks about Mining engineering as a career choice having suffered against other engineering disciplines.

The Bronzewing Gold Project, located 83kms northeast of Leinster and 800km northeast of Perth has been an intriguing story of pass-the-parcel. Initially owned by Mark Creasy, it was then taken over by Joseph Gutnick’ Great Central Mines and then sold to Normandy, which was subsequently taken over by Newmont. Newmont then sold the turf to View Resources which started the mine as an open pit and underground venture before going broke early last year, but having done all the hard work by way of prestripping to get to the ore.

We’re currently looking for an Underground Mining Engineer who is a bit of an “all-rounder” thriving on a variety of roles and responsibilities. Reporting to the Senior Mining Engineer, this position entails core elements of short term mine planning and scheduling, and bridges into operations with management of capital projects and contractor administration. It may also entail drill and blast coverage for leave, leading incident investigations, providing assistance to Operations and the Production Superintendent.

AusGroup Limited (AGL) has just announced the award of a contract by Woodside Energy Ltd (Woodside).

AusGroup’s Australian subsidiary, AGC Industries Pty Ltd (‘AGC’) has been awarded the contract for the provision of fabrication services in support of the maintenance programme at Woodside’s facilities, both onshore, at the Burrup Peninsular and offshore, on the North West Shelf.

This award further extends AusGroup’s ongoing relationship with Woodside, with whom AGC have been providing these fabrication services since 1999.