Byron Lee-Edwards
Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer
Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Marridale Resources. A mining engineer by training, appointed to the role in 2019.
Byron Lee-Edwards has led Marridale Resources since 2019. He joined the company in 2011 as General Manager of Kettle Hill, was appointed Chief Operating Officer in 2015, and took the managing director’s role on the retirement of his predecessor.
He began as a graduate mining engineer in 1998, and has worked in operations for his whole career, including six years in the Pilbara and three in Papua New Guinea. He is the first Marridale chief executive to have run one of the company’s own sites.
“The minerals under this country are a common wealth. A licence is not ownership. It is permission to hold something that belongs to everyone, for a while, and to answer for the state you hand it back in.”
At Marridale
Under his leadership the company has committed to net positive operations by 2050, begun the electrification of the haul fleet at Tallara Basin, and moved rehabilitation planning to the front of the approvals process rather than the end of it. The FY26 accounts carry a rehabilitation provision of $318 million, an increase of 32 per cent, which he has described as “the honest number rather than the comfortable one”.
He chairs the company’s Operating Risk Committee and attends every quarterly meeting of the Board’s Sustainability Committee, which he established in 2020.
Industry and community
- Member, Rehabilitation Working Group, Australian Minerals Council (since 2021)
- Director, Upper North Regional Development Foundation (since 2022)
- Past member, Minerals Skills and Training Advisory Panel (2017–2021)
Speaking
| Engagement | Year |
|---|---|
| “Closure is the product”, Australian Minerals Council annual conference | 2026 |
| Panel: water stewardship in shared catchments, Resources Week | 2025 |
| Address to the Upper North Chamber of Commerce | 2024 |
Education
Bachelor of Engineering (Mining), Honours. Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.
Contact
Requests for interviews, speaking engagements and photography are handled by corporate affairs. A speaker biography and approved photograph are available on request.