THE Port of Port Hedland saw iron ore exports increase in FY18 by 3 per cent to 508.9 million tonnes, and exports are expected to rise for FY19 regardless of the pause in port operations caused by tropical Cyclone Veronica which hit the coast in March of this year.

Cyclone Veronica caused a total shutdown at Port Hedland of 92.5 hours, 132 hours at the Port of Dampier and 109.5 hours at the Port of Ashburn.

PPA chief executive Roger Johnston said despite the longest closure in years resulting in a slightly lower guidance for the big players like Rio Tinto, BHP and FMG, iron ore exports at Port Hedland was still going “gangbusters”.

“A week’s production up here is astonishing, we have something like 47 trains per day delivering iron ore just to Port Hedland – given that trains are three kilometres long, that’s about 150 kilometres of trains per day,” Mr Johnston said.

“Now if you stop for four or five days those are some big numbers which will have a bit of an impact.

“But regardless exports are still going strong and we expect to exceed last year’s tonnage for iron ore.”

Work was currently underway at Port Hedland for a $33.5 million replacement of the Berth 3 deck, which had been predominately used for the export of more than 100mt of salt since its last upgrade 30 years ago.

“There will be a bit of stop and start with the salt exports while we’re refurbishing but it should be finished towards the end of the year and then it’s back to business as usual,” Mr Johnston said.

PPA was also undertaking several facility upgrades with a focus on new and innovative technologies to improve shipping capabilities.

Improvements in the shipping channel at Port Hedland were also set as the final phase of the $120m Channel Risk and Optimisation Project (CROP) was due to be completed in May or June.

The CROP was intended to deliver safety and efficiency benefits in the harbour by providing a refuge zone and emergency passing lane to the 42km unidirectional shipping channel, as well as the removal of high spots in the outer section of the channel to optimise navigable depths.

The CROP was funded under the Port Improvement Rate (PIR); a temporary levy charged on vessels entering and exiting the Port of Port Hedland to fund capital improvements.

The other PIR projects were the Integrated Marine Operations Centre and the Channel Marker Replacement Program.

Mr Johnston said the Integrated Marine Operations Centre (IMOC) had been fully constructed just in time to be tested during Cyclone Veronica.

“We picked up some water damage so it was good to be able to look at that and see if the design to cater for a one in 100 year cyclone was up to the test,” he said.

The Vessel Traffic Services (VTS) installed was state-of-the-art to oversee the safe and efficient movement of around 6000 vessels each year through Port Hedland.

This would include technology for the harbour master function, dredging management, port security, marine pilot briefing facilities and improved incident control capability.

“The technology is cutting edge, it’s absolutely state-of-the-art,” Mr Johnson said.

“All the systems are integrated into each other, there’s nothing like it anywhere on the planet.”

Pilbara Ports Authority
The PPA implemented a hydroid model at the Port of Dampier in 2016 to calculate navigable depth throughout the port and shipping channels.

The Port of Dampier

The Port of Dampier saw 145mt of iron ore exports in FY18 along with more than 3.5mt of salt, and similar increases are expected in 2019 if potential port upgrades get the go-ahead.

The potential redevelopment of the cargo wharf is in the works to cater for new projects in the region; the two proposed 1Mtpa methanol plants potentially located in the Burrup Industrial Estate (BIE) that would require pipelines to the Dampier Bulk Liquids Berth (BLB) marine facility and new loading facilities, and a proposed 2.1Mtpa urea plant that would require a conveyor to the port, storage, loading and wharf facilities.

“We’ve taken some strong steps around engineering and design to extend the Dampier cargo wharf southwards by 330 metres,” Mr Johnston said.

“We’ve looked at the dredging, the turning basin being able to facilitate bigger vessels and we’ve put some serious effort into looking at how to do it, and the potential costs and funding opportunities.”

The PPA had also implemented a new hydroid model at the Port of Dampier in 2016, which had resulted in more accurate calculations of navigable depth throughout the port and shipping cannels.

“It’s our job to optimise infrastructure and our channels are basically infrastructure – so if you let them all silt up then you’re going to load less into your ships because you still need to maintain safe under keel clearance,” Mr Johnston said.

“If you make sure that you’re keeping your channels at designed depth by dredging regularly and taking all the silt out, then you maximise and optimise the loads that ships can carry.”

The new modelling allows the lowest astronomical tide to be calculated, which means a more accurate calculation of the depth of the channels at the lowest astronomical tide.

“We can provide shippers with optimal under keep clearance or the maximum depth that they can load their ships to and that’s been a very successful innovation,” he said.

“We’ve seen some efficiencies out of Dampier – in particular better opportunity windows for companies like Rio to bring their big bulk carriers in.”

Based on the positive outcomes at the Port of Dampier, a hydroid model would also be implemented at the Port of Ashburton in the next 12 months.

Innovative technologies

Mr Johnston said innovative technology was key to advancements across all of PPA’s ports.

“We use a lot of leading technology and while it might sound silly playing with centimetres here and there, when you add it all up it really makes a difference,” he said.

“The use of technology and big data is terribly important for port operations.”

The PPA implemented unique modelling of ship movements in simulators to compare with real movements (the pitch and roll of ships) to make sure the under-keel clearance calculations account for optimising these movements.

“Every extra little bit of centimetres we can get equates to tonnes,” Mr Johnston said.

Part of the PIR project in Port Hedland included the extra dredging of safety bays in the shipping channel.

“When convoying ships and one of the first ones has an engine failure and you have nowhere to push it out of the way then you’re compromising all the following ships,” Mr Johnston said.

“You need to be able to safely push it to one side, so by increasing the depths of our safety bays we can do that.

“One of the reasons we have half hour departure windows is just that – if there is a problem with the vessel in the channel then we have time to do something about it before the next vessel comes along.”

Even something as simple as dredging and improving the safety bays could directly optimise shipping at a unidirectional port like Port Hedland.

“The theory we’re busy with, which will come online in the next two to five years, is that by improving the safety bays and reducing the risk exposure you can do things like facilitate shorter departure windows which means you can get even more ships on a tide,” Mr Johnston said.

Pilbara Ports Authority
The Vessel Traffic Services at Port Hedland cater for around 6000 vessels each year.

Replicating reality

Simulation software was also used for marine pilots to undertake scenario-based training at PPA’s Maritime Simulator facility with HR Wallingford, based in Fremantle, WA.

“There’s nothing like it anywhere else in the world,” Mr Johnston said.

“We have four tug bridges and two ship bridges and a VTS bridge all in communication with each other and we can exactly replicate how we work in ports such as Port Hedland.

“Typically you’ll find simulators elsewhere will have two bridges or maybe three but we have replicated this so we can actually put on full crews and train tug masters and marine pilots all at the same time.”

Any time an incident occurs, PPA would reprogram the simulator to replicate the event.

“During the course of marine pilots and tug masters biannual updates we throw these incidents at them and see how they react and teach them what did actually happen and how to approach the issue,” Mr Johnston said.

PPA also used real-time software which picked up live data on currents and tides in daily port operations.

“Our portable pilot units have unique software that we’ve developed which allows the [marine] pilot to see on the screen how they are transiting on the channel,” Mr Johnston said.

“If anything unusual happens the pilot can interrogate it on the software to simulate a decision before making it in real time.”

Mr Johnston said these ongoing innovations were unique to PPA and essential to the improvement of all its operations in the Pilbara.

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