Throughout the conceptualisation, development, operation and eventual decommissioning of mineral resources projects, there is a wide range of opportunities to contribute to sustainable development (SD). Although some individual organisations have their own SD tools, a practical systematic, rigorous and standardised approach to capture SD opportunities in project management systems is not currently available. Recognising this limitation a collaborative research effort has been undertaken to develop SUSOP (R) (SUStainable OPerations), a new concept that is somewhat analogous to safety cases and hazard and operability studies (HAZOP) used by safety practitioners. This paper raises some of the important SD considerations for mineral industry operations and outlines the development of SUSOP (R) to date. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.