06 July 2020 Cristal Global Site Fibre Infrastructure
2010-2011
Starting before 2010, the senior process control engineer at Cristal Global’s titanium dioxide pigment plant in Kemerton, Western Australia (Note: the business has since changed ownership and become part of Tronox) had identified that additional communications infrastructure was necessary to support the use of future automation and communications technologies. Through a careful planning process it was decided that an automation systems upgrade would be mandatory in the coming years and that the plant required the addition of a formally engineered Safety Instrumented System to the automation regime.
Pathfinder was called in to assist in the design and implementation of fit-for-purpose optical fibre communications infrastructure.
As part of the design a double ring and spur architecture was agreed, with a higher core count being used in the rings to support future use cases which include technologies unknown at the time of installation. Multiple stainless steel outdoor enclosures are combined with equipment room ring access patching locations to provide a convenient choice of physical access locations so that any part of the plant can be quickly patched or linked to any other.
Pathfinder assumed responsibility for the supply, hauling, fit-out, termination and testing of all optical fibre runs and passive elements such as cable tray, outdoor enclosures, racks and fibre optic breakout trays. As the head contractor we subcontracted out the hauling and heavy installation tasks to Swispec, a Bunbury-based electrical contractor.
Pathfinder also supplied custom marked and coloured outdoor loose-tube cable for the dedicated use of the critical systems (automation, safety and control systems). Pathfinder also provided custom made and custom coloured ruggedised patch leads. These custom coloured items provide a visual indication to help in operational identification of these critical infrastructure elements throughout the plant.