Staff dormitory at Grasberg mine

Located in the province of Papua in Indonesia, the Grasberg Mine is the largest gold mine and the second-largest copper mine in the world. Freeport Indonesia sought electronic access control to provide better people mobilization visibility and security for a variety of housing needs for its thousands of employees that work at the Grasberg Mine. 

Secure and reliable electronic door locks were needed for the more than 4,000 doors to improve the efficiency of managing the assignment of the employee barracks, guest houses and apartments.

At the Grasberg Mine, the accommodation facilities can be found from 21m above sea level all the way up to 4267m above sea level which can pose a big challenge for many systems. Freeport Indonesia required a solution that could operate in a remote area with these harsh conditions.

Freeport Indonesia chose SALTO XS4 Original and XS4 Mini electronic locks managed by the SALTO ProAccess SPACE access control management software to provide security for their employee barracks, guest houses, and apartments across multiple buildings. The system operates via SALTO’s innovative SVN data-on-card solution. SVN (SALTO Virtual Network) allows stand-alone locks to read, receive, and write information via an encrypted and secure data-on-card system that utilizes the capabilities of RFID read/write technology. With SVN, all access data is stored on and distributed by its operating smartcard (or other RFID credentials). When presenting a smartcard to an offline stand-alone door, not only does this control access rights to that door but, thanks to two-way communication, the door also writes data like blacklist information or battery status back to the smartcard. The smartcard then transmits this information back to the server via online wall readers that are able to update and receive information from the cards anytime and anywhere in the building. 

The SALTO solution integrates with Freeport’s custom application to print employee ID cards, accommodations bookings, and SAP employee data. 

Rahman Hadi, Freeport General Superintendent MIS Business Application, said the SALTO solution has improved their ability to manage access and capacity of more than 10,000 rooms.

“It is very easy to flexible in adopting specific business requirements and integrate with other systems” said Rahman. “It is a resilient, capable access control system with trusted and sustainable support.”

Rahman added that one of the most important aspects of the solution is SALTO’s detail transparency in audit trail which is essential for managing such a big accommodation site in a remote area like the Grasberg Mine project.