Baffinland is planning to increase their iron ore production on Baffin Island from 6 Mt/y to 22 Mt/y via its proposed Steensby Rail Project. Given the project’s remote arctic location, they sought to understand the dynamics of their seasonal supply chain to estimate practical throughput capacity, identify bottlenecks, minimize costs, and enhance confidence in the ensuing design.
As part of the feasibility study, Ausenco was retained to model Baffinland’s entire supply chain, from the crushing and screening plant at Mary River to the international discharge ports.
Our dynamic simulation model included the following features:
- Mine equipment: crushers, screens, reclaimers, conveyors, train load-out station
- A 150-km railway with sidings
- Port equipment: dumper, conveyors, stacker/reclaimers and shiploader
- Train fleet
- Multiple mine/port stockpiles
- Two vessel fleets
- Planned/unplanned maintenance distributions on all major equipment
Our discrete-event, dynamic simulation model was built using our in-house TLS software, including all major supply chain interactions, operational data, subject matter expert input, and the latest design information. Each of our model runs simulated five full operating years.
Through this model, we analyzed the impact of queuing, congestion, inventory, fleets, and seasonality on the system's ability to achieve the target throughput. Our team utilized the model to test optimization initiatives to inform capital investments and identify potential risk areas for the client.
Challenges and our solutions
Baffinland’s supply chain is complex and multi-faceted due to its different modes of transportation, seasonality, and distance (from the mines to international discharge port zones). Ausenco’s expertise and tools allowed us to simulate interactions between all these systems.
The supply chain’s shipping schedule was seasonal which in turn caused ~9 Mt of inventory to build up during the ice season. Our team was able to deliver a solution that optimized Baffinland’s shipping plan to recover quickly and deliver product to global customers as uniformly as possible throughout the year.
Outcomes and achievements
Using the dynamic model, our team confirmed the supply chain's capacity to achieve the target throughput (22 Mt/y), increasing Baffinland’s confidence in the project’s feasibility. We identified, quantified and made recommendations to mitigate risks that helped achieve the target, such as improving the dumper which was projected to become the supply chain’s bottleneck.
We also demonstrated that the various stockpiles were appropriately sized to absorb surges and lulls caused by delays throughout the system.