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Modern societies are characterised by global connectedness and complexity. At the same time society, and the various infrastructures that connect and define it, are understood to be increasingly threatened by unpredictable and uncertain (or unknown) global risks. With this, the conceptualisation and development of resilience has become a dominant, yet enigmatic preoccupation: dominant because it is seen as a fundamental component of devolved proactive approaches to mitigating complex threats whatever their nature; and enigmatic because its practical application is as diverse as its definitions. Today, however, a significant challenge still lies in the accurate characterisation and quantification of resilience, and thus also the ability to provide a systematic basis for policy-making in resilience-based threat mitigation. This article examines the methodological challenges of operationalising resilience. It draws on several cases that detail ways of measuring resilience, reflecting on the development, bene...

Mining in Australia is booming. Notwithstanding, production conditions are progressively transitioning from the mining of "cheaper, easily accessible and higher quality ores" to "lower grade, more remote, complex and expensive ores". Sustainability discussions in the minerals industry have largely sought to improve the social and environmental performance of individual operations, including planning for closure. However, the national implications of a change in the circumstances underpinning the current prosperity of mining are underexplored. This paper uses a peak minerals metaphor to map "life-of-resource" environmental and social considerations, pre- and post-peak production, at local and national scales. An examination of how the social and environmental impacts change, over the life of a resource's extraction, is used to inform strategies for the role of technological and policy innovation in underpinning long-term national benefit from minerals in Australia. © Institution of Engineers Australia, 2012.