36 36 Page 36 By Frank Giorno It takes many community partners to create a mining economic cluster with local nati onal and global reach like the one that has evolved in Sud bury Since its founding in 1995 The Northern Centre for Advanced T ech nology NORCA T a nonproft or ganization has empowered clients staf and community partners to thrive in a culture of productivity in novation and lifelong learning Located in Sudbury Ontario the NORCA T Centre stands at approxi mately 70000 square feet and is home to its health and safety training and development centre entrepre neurial and innovation services and incubator and event centre NORCA T is constantly improving and upgrading the services it pro vides In 2017 NORCA T acquired W ork place T raining and Safety First a Thunder Bay based leader in skilled labour training and development pro grams in Northwestern Ontario The acquisition enables NORCA T to ex pand its industry leading world class programs services and resources to new markets in providing workplace NORCA T A catalyst in making Sudbury a world leading innovator in mining technology health and safety training health and safety training Furthering its commitment invested in technology and innovation in 2017 NORCA T launched the Safety W allet app and an avatar based Mine Res cue Simulation T raining T ool which was featured at the Canadian Mining Games Also in 2017 NORCA T received al most 1M in federal and provincial funding to expand the Under ground Centre to develop new innovative mining technologies NORCA T was founded in 1995 by Darryl Lake who was inducted in to the SAMSSA Hall of Fame in 2006 for the work he did in support of Sudbury s business community and in training young people to create jobs locally In 1995 Lake left his position as Cam brian College s dean of health scienc es trades and technology and started the Northern Centre for Advanced T echnology NORCA T Lake left a comfortable job to start a nonproft or ganization at a time many others were going under T o establish a stable base of revenue of operations for NORCA T Lake brought over the Occupational Health and Safety Resource Centre and the On tario Centre for Ground Control T rain ing that he had started at Cambrian NORCA T soon became one of the world s leadin g occupationa l health and safety trai ning centres and it has grown to become a centre for entre preneurship and innovation as well T oday NORCA T has three main fo cuses The Innovation Mill T raining in W orkplace Health and Safety and mining educati on operating facilities that can be used by clients to increase safety and productivity NORCA T s Innovation Mill serves as Sudbury s Regional Innovation Cen tre partnering with community stake holders to help start and accelerate the growth of innovative companies NORCA T is part of the Ontario Net work of Entrepreneurs Atlas Copco has been developing modern solutions for customers in more than 180 countries around the world The company employs more than 750 people in Canada at 200 loca tions specializing in construction and mining equipm ent NORCA T s Un der ground Centre was used by Atlas Copco to test refne and demonstrate some of its most recent advancements in mining technology such as the re mote frequency identifcation systems Contd on pg 38 Page 36 Page 37 Where v er y our mine is loc at ed y ou c an rely on A ggrek o t o pro vide reliable po w er and t emper ature c ontrol solutions quickly and af f ordably Po w er and c ooling f or the mining industr y 18AGG013 Mining Journal Half Pg Adindd 1 41418 1230 PM