Fortescue in a hurry to squeeze new assets

Fortescue Metals Group is in a hurry.

Barely two weeks after bringing its latest mine into production and shifting gear from construction to operations, the world's fourth largest iron ore miner is already talking about increasing capacity.

Fortescue showed off its new Kings mine as well as its rail and port operations this week, hinting that it's looking to export up to 175 million tonnes per annum (mtpa) from the Pilbara.

For the foreseeable future, any extra capacity will have to come from squeezing existing assets beyond the company's stated goal of 155 mtpa by March next year.

Chief executive Nev Power says he wants to run the company efficiently and avoid building infrastructure and loading up on more debt.

"Our first strategy is to drive what we've got as hard as we can, sweat the assets and get that maximum out," Mr Power told reporters during a tour of the company's Pilbara operations this week.

"We think that's 15 to 20 million tonnes that we might be able to squeeze out of it."

He said Fortescue had originally designed the layout of its Port Hedland operations to cater for a capacity of up to 200 million tonnes.

The design of Herb Elliot Port would allow Fortescue to keep expanding without outlaying too much capital.

Official estimates put the overall export capacity of Port Hedland, Australia's largest bulk commodities port, at 495 million tonnes.

But Mr Power believes the real capacity is somewhere between 600 million and 700 million tonnes.

Any future decision to build a fifth berth at Herb Elliott Port would be significant, given the company's debt profile, he said.

Fortescue is trying to reduce its $12 billion debt pile by around $4 billion to $5 billion over the next couple of years while the iron ore price remains buoyant and as the company delivers on its production targets.

The talk of extra capacity comes after mining giant Rio Tinto recently committed $400 million to upgrade its port facilities in the Pilbara as part of its plan to reach 360 million tonnes.

While Fortescue has some way to go to compete with the likes of Rio and BHP Billiton, the company says it is now a lower cost producer than Brazil's iron ore giant Vale.

Improving productivity and efficiency with berths and ship loaders at Port Hedland is key.

Mr Power says such improvements should be a high priority for all Pilbara iron ore producers.

"The more efficient they are and the more efficient we are, the more tonnes are going to go out through the port," he said.

"It's in everyone's interests."

He also gave an insight into Fortescue's plans to automate part of its trucking workforce, taking the media to view a dozen massive unmanned autonomous trucks as they collected iron ore from an excavator.

But it wasn't all smooth sailing as a computer glitch caused the trucks to stop for about an hour.

If a six-month trial of the futuristic Caterpillar trucks is successful, Fortescue plans to purchase up to 45 vehicles valued at $5 million to $6 million each.

Those trucks would carry around a third of the company's iron ore and do the job of 55 manual trucks.

But for now, Fortescue is stripping back its workforce for the production phase and monitoring its multinational competitors for further expansion plans.

Mr Power says Fortescue will only look at bringing forward future expansion plans if the iron ore market becomes heavily undersupplied.

"Our objective is to make sure that we've got a pipeline of projects that's ready to do when the time is right," he said.