Mining and critical minerals
A project announcement gives a job number and a start date. A mine needs permits, power, capital, and workers in the right order. DDA follows a project through the dependencies between the resource and the first ton of product, and finds the gate that limits the date.
01 The delivery chain
A mine moves through a fixed sequence. A resource estimate supports a feasibility study. The project earns its environmental and operating permits. The owner reaches a financing and final investment decision. Construction needs a workforce, a camp, access, and power. Commissioning follows, then operations.
Each gate has a date and a dependency. A permit sequence sets the start of construction. A power connection sets the start of commissioning. The workforce for construction differs from the workforce for operations, and the two draw on different labour markets.
02 The evidence problem
Public evidence on a project comes from technical reports, company filings, and the permit record. A technical report gives capital cost, schedule, and workforce estimates at a stated accuracy. A company filing gives the current schedule and the funding position. The provincial permit record shows the stage of the environmental assessment and the conditions attached.
Job numbers need care. Construction employment peaks for a short period and falls. Operating employment is smaller and lasts for years. An announcement can blend the two. DDA reads the workforce estimate by phase and by trade, and states which number the source gives.
Agreements between a company and a community are often confidential. DDA does not assume their terms. The analysis states that the terms are unknown and shows what depends on them.
Regional benefit needs a test. A large share of project spending can go to outside contractors, imported equipment, and non-resident workers. DDA separates gross project spending from the part that stays in the region.
03 Where it usually breaks
The workforce breaks at a specific trade and phase. A project can have enough general labour and lack the certified pipefitters that commissioning needs. The gap sits on the critical path, and no substitute exists. Total regional labour supply says nothing about it. Concurrent projects make it worse, because several projects draw on one pool of the same trades in the same years.
Power breaks the schedule when a connection needs years and the project assumed months. Interconnection studies, transmission upgrades, and utility agreements all add time.
Camp capacity caps the number of workers that a remote site can house each month. Rotation schedules set how many workers the site needs on the payroll to fill each position.
Financing breaks at the investment decision. A project can meet every technical test and still wait for capital. Cost revisions between the feasibility study and the decision can change the economics.
Community agreements and workforce participation targets can also stop a start. A target that no training pipeline can meet in the time available needs its own analysis.
04 What the work can produce
The work can produce a project delivery-chain analysis with each gate and its evidence status, a trade-by-phase labour analysis, a concurrency analysis for several projects in one region, a delay-cost model that separates deferral from destruction of value, a regional capture analysis, a break-point analysis with observable signals, and an implementation monitor. For a community, the work can produce a readiness assessment of what the region must do before a project starts.
05 Connected capabilities and related thinking
This area uses Labour and workforce analysis, Land, infrastructure, and spatial analysis, and Fiscal and scenario modelling. Read The trade gap hidden inside a workforce number for a worked example. For power, see Energy and electricity. For regional benefit, see Economic and market analysis.
06 Bring the question
Send the project schedule, the technical report, the workforce estimate, or the plan for a community near a project. DDA will find the gate that limits the date and identify what can move it.