14 August, 2017 marks the one-year anniversary for in2Dredging Pty Ltd (i2D), a young and dynamic independent dredging consultancy. Twelve months after its launch, the company is proudly serving a growing client base and continues to deliver value adding solutions to clients, contractors and engineers.
i2D provides A to Z dredging support and develops innovative solutions for dredging projects and equipment. Within its first month of operation, i2D won its first large assignment, which involved providing site supervision for the HMAS Stirling maintenance dredging project.
Following the successful completion of the HMAS Stirling project, TAMS requested i2D’s assistance with the clean-up dredging phase of Chevron’s LNG Wheatstone project. The scope of this phase of the project was initially small, and thus a backhoe dredge and plough spread was considered sufficient to complete the works. However, due to recent sedimentation, the scope of the project became significantly larger, and a second campaign was executed with a trailer suction dredger. i2D’s consultants were involved throughout the project providing project execution supervision, estimating and tendering services, as well as software development services in the form of the development of timesaving software tools.
In successive months, i2D increased its team and its skills set. Senior client representative, project engineer and software developer Ralph Brevet joined i2D at its inception. In October 2016, Valerie Biernaux joined the team thus expanding i2D’s environmental services capabilities. Finally, in December 2016, principal dredging consultant Greg Miller joined the team enabling integration of two generations of dredging professionals. In addition, i2D has an extensive network of dredging professionals that it can call on and is thus able to cater for any workload.
In its first year of operations, i2D was also involved in the following projects:
- Beach Replenishments project near SydneyAfter completing a Conceptual Study, i2D advised Water Technology to utilise small hopper dredges to perform its foreshore replenishment instead of the large hopper dredgers, floating pipelines and spray pontoons initially envisaged for the project. The work methodology advised by i2D was found to not only significantly reduced the project’s budget but also shortened the project’s schedule.Water Technology accepted i2D’s advice and the beach replenishment project is currently being executed using the methodology suggested by i2D.
- Fortescue Mineral Mining (FMG) projecti2D provided dredging consulting services for this project. After successfully prequalifying to work with a major mineral mining company, i2D performed a schedule risk assessment for dredging a tug harbour in Port Hedland with a cutter suction dredge and pumping the slurry to the sandfill.
- Tender for the Fremantle underwater rock abutmenti2D assisted TAMS to tender for the Fremantle underwater rock abutment. The project was successfully awarded to TAMS and is currently being executed.
One of i2D’s main missions is to continuously invest in R&D. To this end, in this first year of operation, i2D has launched a unique suction and discharge production estimation tool called Pumps ‘n Pipeline (PnP), with Version 1.2 of this tool being launched shortly.
i2D has also successfully developed QACheck, a tool that quickly and reliably checked compliance of log data files for the Wheatstone project, which proved to be very effective. Thus, i2D is currently developing a version of QACheck suitable for any dredging project.
Last but not least, i2D is currently developing a tool that models the quality of return water. This tool will be made available to the public in the second half of 2017.
