In recent weeks the Queensland, South Australian (SA), Western Australian (WA) state branches of Cement & Concrete Aggregates Australia (CCAA) have announced the winners of their coveted annual industry awards. New South Wales held its event on 16 August and Victoria is scheduled to hold its awards on 22 August. Tasmania’s awards were held in May.
Entrants have traditionally been considered across three categories: health and safety, environment, and community engagement. This year the awards were extended to include a workplace diversity and inclusion category.
In the state awards unveiled so far in the past month, Hanson was the winner of the health and safety award in WA, as well as receiving awards in the environmental and community engagement categories in Queensland.
The company’s Midland and Gnangara concrete plants in WA were commended for their installation of guarding panels mounted on a rail system to improve safety around plant equipment. The design addressed several key elements including compliance to current standards, reduced risk exposure, and increased plant efficiency.
In Queensland, Hanson’s Wolffdene Quarry won the environmental award after an employee produced a stormwater management system from recycled and repurposed materials. The system, which costed only $1400, combines pump and sprinkler systems to distribute liquid flocculant through a network of block flocculant dispersal points, and during significant rain events substantially reduced sediments in a single day.
Boral’s two awards were for health and safety innovations. It was recognised in SA for use of the Konnect Segnut, which removes the necessity of high risk nut removal equipment and techniques – such as hydraulic nut splitter or oxy cutting – when changing out cutting edges on front-end loader buckets.
The company’s second safety award, in Queensland, was for a new drawbar design for truck and dog tipper trailers. Adopting a single central hollow main tube design, it protects all cabling and hoses, is self-cleaning, decreases maintenance costs and reduces the risk of the truck jack-knifing in an accident.
In WA, Holcim was named the winner of one category and also received a highly commended award for health and safety in Queensland. Its winning prize was in the diversity and inclusion category after a new maternity range was added to its corporate and industrial workwear catalogue for expectant mothers.
Local company shines at SA awards
Meanwhile, Adelaide-headquartered construction materials and lime producer Adelaide Brighton dominated the SA awards. It was the named the winner of two award categories, and highly commended for a third.
It was judged the joint winner of the environment prize for becoming the first Australian company to burn refuse derived fuels (RDF). The company achieved this by re-engineering its Birkenhead Plant kiln firing system to allow for the burning of RDF, in turn, reducing total reliance on fossil fuels – in this case natural gas.
The company’s second winning prize was in the diversity and inclusion section after it partnered with the University of Adelaide in 2018 to provide annual scholarships to three female engineering students.
Each year more than 1100 representatives attend the annual state awards from industry, and government, as well as suppliers and sponsors. Respective category winners will go on to compete at the national awards hosted at the Construction Materials Industry Conference, the industry’s premier biennial event, in 2020.
IMAGE GALLERY
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