Client
Fortescue
Location
Pilbara, Western Australia
Industry
Mining
Overview
The Iron Bridge site is in the Pilbara region of Western Australia, 145km south of Port Hedland, and encompasses the North Star, Eastern Limb, Glacier Valley and West Star magnetite iron ore deposits.
Iron Bridge includes the construction of a process plant, non-process infrastructure, slurry and return water pipelines, a raw water pipeline and port infrastructure to support the production of 22 wmtpa of high-grade 67% Fe magnetite concentrate product.
Scope
Intellect Systems was selected as the operational technology partner of choice by Fortescue to work embedded within the project’s System Integration team. Our control systems and electrical engineers undertook a range of system integration activities, including design, documentation, and software development necessary for the Safety Instrumented Systems (SIS), Programmable Logic Controllers (PLC), Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems as well as Power Management System (PMS).
All work was conducted in strict adherence to the Fortescue standards, ensuring the project met the highest industry benchmarks.
Smarter Solutions
The Intellect Systems team comprised of highly skilled control systems, safety systems and electrical engineers with a proven track record in executing large-scale system integration projects, including previous work on Fortescue projects. Drawing from their prior knowledge of the client’s processes and standards, the team brought operational efficiencies from the project’s outset.
Before commencing code development, our team rigorously reviewed and validated the client’s proposed design documentation, which supported configuration and programming activities and set the foundations for standardisation, testing and quality control. This proactive approach aided the early identification and resolution of potential issues, saving the client time and money.
The Intellect team set the criteria for designing and programming the project’s Programmable Logic Controller (PLC), Safety System (SIS) and Human Machine Interface (HMI) systems with an execution strategy. The strategy prioritised efficient control and monitoring of all equipment and processes for operations personnel, as well as the implementation of scalable and maintainable code.
Through our established relationships with vendors, Intellect gained access to project-specific support, providing a seamless interface throughout the design development, testing, and commissioning phases.
Intellect was able to reduce on-site efforts during Site Acceptance Testing (SAT) due to our experience delivering the electrical infrastructure on the project and ability to utilise our in-house staging environments and manufacturing facility to perform successful integrated Factory Acceptance Testing (FAT).
Intellect Systems took a proactive approach and leveraged its expertise to deliver a robust control system solution tailored to Fortescue’s needs. This ensured efficient and maintainable operations, minimised project risks, and delivered significant value to the client.
