HF Integration
Overview
HF Integration Pty Ltd (HFI) was established in Perth, Western Australia in 2015. HFI is a specialist human factors consultancy, with a team of dedicated human factors consultants providing expert advice to clients in hazardous, safety critical industries, including oil and gas, mining, and transportation. HFI’s history has centred on major capital projects in offshore energy (Woodside, Chevron, Santos), resources (BHP, Rio Tinto, Fortescue, South32), and rail (Public Transport Authority WA, Alstom, Siemens, MTR Hong Kong), rather than direct defence sector engagement to date. However HFI is now seeking to extend this applied, major-capital-project human factors capability into the WA defence industry, recognising that the human factors challenges in complex, safety critical, high consequence systems are the same discipline regardless of sector.
Before establishing HF Integration, our Director, Andrew Sutherland, previously worked on defence sector projects in the UK, including RAF and Army procurement projects and significant nuclear defence capability upgrade projects at the Atomic Weapons Establishment in Aldermaston, UK.
Capabilities
HFI’s capability spans the full project lifecycle: Human Factors Integration Management, Early Human Factors Analyses, and Human Factors Integration Plans from concept through to decommissioning. Core services include manning, task, and workload analysis; systematic human error identification and Safety Critical Task Risk Assessment (management of human reliability risk to ALARP/SFAIRP); ergonomic and workplace design; control rooms, HMI, and alarms design (including full ISO 11064 application); automation and change management impact assessment; risk-based training needs analysis; and human factors input to safety cases and safety assurance.
Recent examples of this capability in practice include: predictive workload and human reliability analyses for Rio Tinto’s AutoHaul autonomous rail system; a Human Factors Engineering design standard developed for Fortescue’s green energy and hydrogen projects; human factors design assurance on significant LNG projects for Chevron and Woodside; full human factors integration in the design of rolling stock, stations and other transport infrastructure for metro systems in Sydney, Hong Kong and Perth, and long term integration of human factors requirements for new signalling on BHP’s iron ore rail network.
HFI has not yet delivered a project directly for the defence industry. The examples above demonstrate directly transferable capability, applied to complex, safety critical, major capital projects at the same scale and risk profile as defence acquisition and sustainment programs.
Discriminators
1: A dedicated, specialist human factors consultancy, not a generalist engineering or safety practice offering human factors as a secondary service 2: A team of specialist human factors consultants led by a Director and a Principal Human Factors Consultant, plus senior, mid-level, and graduate consultants and an in-house cybersecurity specialist 3: A qualified and experienced team that holds genuine tertiary qualifications in human factors, and are recognised as industry experts 4: Established relationships with major operators across energy and resources: Woodside, Chevron, BHP, Rio Tinto, Fortescue, South32, Wesfarmers 5: Established relationships with major infrastructure and complex systems engineering clients: Alstom, Siemens, Public Transport Authority (WA), Pacific National, MTR Hong Kong, SMEC, Arcadis, Hitachi, GHD, AECOM, Water Corporation, Arc Infrastructure 6: Genuine experts in full-lifecycle human factors integration model, from concept through to decommissioning, with experience established across a range of industries