Kathy Ehrig, Superintendent Geometallurgy at Olympic Dam in South Australia, has won the Australian Geoscience Council’s (AGC) Roy Woodall Medal.

This award, launched in 2020, recognises scientific excellence in mineral exploration and the documentation of world-class mineral deposits, whilst honouring the late Roy Woodall, and the impact he made to mineral geoscience over his lifetime.

Roy’s scientific approach and technical leadership to mineral exploration greatly contributed to the discovery of our Olympic Dam deposit in 1975.

Last week, the AGC announced Kathy as the inaugural winner of the award. Kathy has been recognised for her work in documenting the geology and mineralogy of the Olympic Dam deposit, as well as being a leading contributor in the emerging discipline of geometallurgy.

On receiving the award, Kathy said, “It is an honour to receive the Roy Woodall Medal, especially since Roy hired me 30 years ago to study and document how the Olympic Dam deposit formed. However, this journey of discovery and innovation has been a team effort, not the work of me alone.”

Below is a summary of some of Kathy’s achievements to date, which demonstrate the extensive impact she has had on the industry.

• Supervision of 14 PhD students on numerous aspects of the geology of Olympic Dam
• Co-authorship of over 65 publications, and cited more than 1900 times
• The AusIMM Professional Excellence Award (2017)

Kathy has also delivered more than 40 presentations at conferences around the globe on the Olympic Dam orebody, and the science of geometallurgy more broadly.