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Landloch StaffDr Rob Loch, B.Agr.Sc., B.A., Ph.D., CPSS Rob has over 30 years experience in the research and application of land management, soil conservation, and land rehabilitation, both nationally and internationally. His experience encompasses dryland and irrigated agriculture, feedlots, forest management, effluent disposal, and minesites. He has particular expertise in the measurement and modelling of soil erosion and sediment movement, in the management of soil profile productivity, and in soil remediation. His achievements include development of new methods for assessing erodibility of Australian soils, for measuring sediment properties, and for assessing soil properties that determine infiltration rates of rainfall. His current research interests include:
His work has been distinctive for its emphasis on the need to consider erosion processes, particularly in identifying causes of instability and potential methods for site stabilisation. He has published over 100 technical articles, including over 50 in refereed scientific journals. He is an Honorary Research Fellow of the University of Southern Queensland. Cameron Vacher, B.E. (Civil), Grad.
Cert. (Mineral Resources), CID (ASP2104) Cam has extensive experience with computer modelling of erosion and assessment of soil erodibility, and in the identification and management of dispersive mine spoils. He has considerable experience with rehabilitation monitoring, including use of Ecosystem Function Analysis, digital photogrammetry, Landloch’s Geomorphic Gully Assessment System and instrumented runoff/erosion plots to monitor long-term stability of rehabilitation areas. His previous experience has included irrigation design and software support and he is a current Certified Irrigation Designer (Agricultural Sprinklers ASP2104) — 2001. Evan Howard B. Eng. (Environmental) Evan has particular interests in soil and spoil characteristics, water use efficiency and wastewater reuse. He has experience in water use efficiency for irrigated agriculture and has performed water balance studies on a wide range of distribution and irrigation systems. He has worked with the latest technologies used to measure all facets of water balances, including flow meters, weather stations, water storage depth sensors and soil water infiltration and deep drainage sensors. He also has experience in modelling erosion and soil water balances of soil/vegetation under a range of management conditions. He is currently involved in planning and investigating urban water reuse options including grey water recycling and sustainable effluent disposal systems. Evan is also a Certified Landscape Irrigation Auditor. Tim Loch Tim Loch is responsible for equipment construction and maintenance, including rainfall simulators and ancillaries, flumes, vehicles, installation and maintenance of field plots. His work includes field and laboratory erosion studies (flume and rainfall simulator measurements, plot construction, sample analysis). He has been involved in rainfall simulator studies on minesites in South Africa and New Caledonia, Queensland, Western Australia and the Northern Territory; in agricultural and manufacturing areas in Queensland, and a range of other field measurements on sites in Queensland and New South Wales. He is also responsible for soil sampling (collection of cores and bulk samples), and Ecosystem Function Analysis (EFA) monitoring (EFA fieldwork, rill assessments). Landloch AssociatesLandloch has a number of Associates who are nationally and internationally-recognised experts in a range of fields. These scientists contribute knowledge and expertise to Landloch projects, and, on occasion, provide additional training to Landloch staff. They include: Mr D. Tongway David Tongway has developed a method to analyse natural ecosystems to determine the nature of their basic functioning. This involves recognising terrain / soil / vegetation patterns and measuring the processes at work in regulating the spatial distribution of limiting resources (water and soil nutrients). The assessment of degradation of those lands is achieved by determining the way the basic processes are broken down by inappropriate management or rare climatic events This approach has resulted in an objective framework and assessment process of land degradation or desertification, and a rational way of dealing with it. This approach is called Landscape Function Analysis (LFA). Soil fertility and stability measurements are used to define nutrient pool sizes that are affected by degradation and rehabilitation. The LFA approach is also being used to analyse the success of the rehabilitation of lands affected by mining. Coal mines in the Bowen Basin in Queensland were studied as examples of how to create a sustainable ecosystem from spoil dumps comprised of a wide range of geological material. Soil formation processes were studied by a multi-disciplinary team. The nature of the final landform is determined only after specifying the nature of the final land-use. Appropriate landforms can then be devised, based on the functional needs of that land use. He was Principal Researcher for an ACMER funded project on Indicators of Ecosystem Rehabilitation Success and Benchmarks. This project examined rehabilitation success and suggested appropriate indicators of rehabilitation progress across a wide range of mine types in Australia. Dr P. Truong Dr Paul Truong’s specialist fields include:
He is Australia’s leading authority on all aspects of vetiver grass applications. For further information, go to: http://www.uq.net.au/veticon/ Dr G. Hancock Dr Greg Hancock at the School of Environmental and Life Sciences at The University of Newcastle has been working since 1993 with the SIBERIA landscape development and soil erosion model examining the long-term prediction of landscape stability. He has extensive experience in hydrological data analysis and erosion model parameter derivation and the use of SIBERIA as a mine rehabilitation tool. The unique ability of SIBERIA is that it uses a three dimensional representation of the landscape to calculate runoff and sediment and dynamically adjusts landscape elevations as a result of erosion and deposition. This allows the ability to not only calculate sediment loss but to also visualize how and where erosion occurs. SIBERIA has been used extensively in the mining industry for the assessment of landform stability of waste rock dumps, tailings dams and as a research tool for landscape design. Dr B. Yu Dr Yu has more than 10 years research experience in the broad field of climate-hydrology-soil erosion-river landforms with an emphasis on hydrologic modelling. Dr Yu deeply believes that working with and through a series of precipitation-related processes is crucial for a better understanding of the physical environment in which we live. He has worked in many different countries including China, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, Thailand and the U.S. His technical expertises of relevance to Landloch Pty Ltd include: Dr Yu also maintains a web site dedicated to hydrologic and erosion research: http://www.watererosion.net Strategic PartnershipsRally Revegetation and Environmental Services Landloch regularly works in cooperation with Rally Revegetation & Environmental Services (www.rallyreveg.com) on a range of minesite rehabilitation projects in Western Australia and Queensland. The alliance between the two companies has enabled a more complete range of services to be offered to clients, and given greater opportunity for the two companies to achieve world’s best practice in minesite rehabilitation. O’Kane Consultants Inc. Landloch has carried out a number of projects in cooperation with O’Kane Consultants Inc. (http://www.okane-consultants.com/about.html). Landloch’s role has been to provide input on runoff, erosion and sediment control issues associated with cover systems designed by O’Kane Consultants Inc. |