Capabilities

Strategy, judgement and analytics for capital-intensive technology decisions.

From early screening to fleet- and project-scale investment cases, delivered through experience-led consulting capabilities paired with a custom techno-economic modelling toolkit.

Consulting capabilities

Where we add value

Technology Strategy, Evaluation & Advisory

  • Fleet transition and value-led decarbonisation strategy
  • Technical-maturity, feasibility and optioneering analysis
  • Value-Ease technology screening and prioritisation
  • Techno-economic analysis and Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) modelling
  • Prototype design and demonstration planning
  • Technology development and implementation advice: technical, management and execution

Heavy-Haul Rail & Mine Fleets

  • Heavy-haul locomotive and train design and operation (diesel-electric and electric)
  • Novel battery-electric and hybrid platforms
  • Heavy Mine and Mobile Equipment (HME) fleet transition across all major pathways
  • Infrastructure strategy, Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) engagement and prototype programs

Mining & Mineral Processing

  • Project due diligence and portfolio prioritisation
  • Critical-minerals due diligence and supply risk (Li, Ni, Co, REE, Mn)
  • Investment viability and ramp-up risk review, benchmarked against industry (McNulty) ramp-up curves
  • Flowsheet evaluation and investment cases
  • Data-led debottlenecking of operating plants

Collaborative Advisory

  • Facilitation of complex problem-solving and alignment workshops
  • Research integration with universities
  • Stakeholder, government and OEM alignment
  • Formulating winning themes for government grants
Deep domain expertise

Where our knowledge runs deepest

Techno-economic judgment is only as good as the domain knowledge underneath it. These are the fields where the HIC team's expertise is career-deep.

Heavy-haul rail & rolling stock

Roger Buckley

Over 35 years of rail and systems engineering, including nine years as Chief Engineer of Aurizon's national rolling stock fleet and four leading its fleet decarbonisation program: locomotive and train design, technical governance, and integrating new propulsion technologies into live operations.

Mineral processing

Grant Wellwood · Damien Harding

Careers in mineral processing research and innovation at Rio Tinto, BHP and CSIRO: flowsheet development, flotation and ore sorting, and pilot-to-commercial scale-up, backed by more than 30 patents.

Battery technology

Damien Harding · Roger Buckley · Jonathan Burton

How batteries really behave in heavy applications: performance limits, optimal sizing and hybrid configurations, grounded in research published with the University of Queensland on battery and hydrogen propulsion in heavy-haul rail.

Techno-economic modelling & simulation

Jonathan Burton · Damien Harding · Grant Wellwood

Advanced cost-and-value modelling, process simulation, and sensitivity and Monte Carlo risk analysis: the quantitative engine behind HIC's fleet-transition strategies and mineral processing investment cases.

Analytics & simulation

A custom techno-economic modelling toolkit

Every model is built around the client's data, operations and constraints, capturing complexity that generic tools miss. Options are screened and evaluated, then the survivors are deep-modelled.

1

Operational & technical analysis

Model the operation from real data: energy and duty cycles for a fleet, or unit operations, metallurgy and recovery for a process.

2

Screen & shortlist

Value-Ease screening and technical-maturity / feasibility optioneering, triaging the field to the options worth deep analysis.

3

Techno-economic modelling

Full cost-and-value modelling of each shortlisted option: total cost of ownership for a decarbonisation decision, or recovery, net present value and ramp-up risk for a processing or project decision.

4

Scenario & risk analysis

Sensitivities, staging and risk: investment timing and procurement strategy, or production ramp-up and supply-risk scenarios.