What we did:
The work was lead by a small PIP team and involved a cross section of senior project staff from finance, mining, processing and infrastructure areas. As a group or smaller specialised teams, the following work was undertaken:
- A review of the project that identified major value areas and high level opportunities
- Numerous detailed idea generation sessions that focused on these high value areas to create a more detailed scope for value creating ideas and a short term workplan
- Technical, financial and risk analysis undertaken for each idea
- Review by the broader group to refine and further improve analysis
- Development of detailed workplan with specific accountabilities and timelines
- Development of a comprehensive tracker to support the workplans.
Six major areas were identified and ideas were developed for each of these areas. The total value of improvements identified was over US$1.1b.
- Throughput optimisation: Value created by optimising the base case to maximise throughput with very little additional capex or operational risks. This generated a significant additional value for the project by delivering revenue earlier. Alternative designs giving even higher and lower throughputs were also tested, but were not selected due to costs, risks or profitability.
- Waste management: Improving the management of waste materials increased the value of the project through an extension of mine life of up to 3 years with little additional capex.
- Capital optimisation: Reduced capex through a range of ideas to (a) eliminate unnecessary equipment through improved design and the use of alternative technologies or (b) improve the trade-off of capex between different areas of the operation. A number of these ideas also reduced known risks for the project.
- Processing ramp-up: Additional value generated by increasing the achievement of maximum design throughput in the first 2 years of operation. Specific ideas developed to enable a revised forecast in 12 month's time.
- Contamination penalties: Reduced contamination penalties by refining operations to work better within available market constraints.
- Power plant optimisation: Reduced capex and opex by refining power requirements (~15% reduction) using other projects as a benchmark and a more optimised design. Further additional savings possible through the refinement of peak load (improved phasing of loads etc.).
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