Our Work

At Fonntes, they work in performance assessment and safety audits of dams and piles, carrying out safety audits based on current regulations, and studies of the structure’s operational performance, whether for current operating conditions or hypothetical future conditions. The company assesses the safety conditions of structures, diagnoses, and identifies risk factors. It also works on characterising the actions required to rehabilitate and establish the safety of the structure, drawing up action plans, and monitoring plans as a way of bringing greater safety to your site. It develops safety inspection manuals and operating manuals, instrumentation plans, taking readings and evaluating the performance of existing instrumentation, always with the highest quality.

At Fonntes, they strive to comply with safety norms and standards in order to reduce the risk of dam accidents and their consequences. That is why they offer their clients the service of drawing up and updating dam safety plans, in compliance with Federal Law 12.334, which regulates the safety actions to be adopted in the phases of planning, design, construction, first filling, and first spillage, operation, decommissioning, and future use of dams. The company monitors and follows up on the safety actions taken by those responsible for the dams, based on inspections, as well as providing guidance and correcting safety measures. In order to provide greater safety for your project, it also draws up and updates plans based on FMEA-type risk analyses, carries out dam break studies, simulates a hypothetical dam failure, and draws up emergency action plans and contingency plans.

The company carries out studies related to the stability of mining pit slopes, both in rock and soil, as well as railway slopes and those adjacent to the buildings.

Geomechanics, also known as rock mechanics, is the branch of geotechnics that studies the behaviour of rock massifs under the various stresses imposed by engineering works. For example: tunnels, galleries, excavations in underground mines and open-pits, as well as road and railway embankments. At Fonntes, geomechanical studies generally involve two stages: The first stage consists of acquiring surface and subsurface data from geological-geomechanical mapping and the description of boreholes, respectively. In these activities, the professional carrying them out must survey a series of parameters relating to the intact rock and discontinuities according to the empirical criteria for classifying massifs established in the literature. Fonntes adopts the criteria for classifying rock massifs defined by Barton and Bieniawski, and, therefore, surveys an average of 10 parameters, namely: degrees of resistance, fracturing and alteration, RQD (Rock Quality Designation), number of discontinuity families (Jn), degrees of alteration (Ja), and roughness (Jr) of the discontinuity walls as well as persistence, type of filling and size of the discontinuity opening. In the second stage, all the data collected in the field is processed, the results of laboratory tests are evaluated and the lithogeomechanical sectors are defined, i.e. regions of the studied area that show similar geomechanical behaviour and kinematic rupture potentials. The limit and numerical equilibrium analyses are then carried out in order to propose the optimum and stable geometry to be implemented in the project, whether it is an underground or open-pit excavation.

Hydrogeology is the branch of hydrology that studies groundwater, especially its relationship with the geological environment, making it one of the earth sciences, but with a strong engineering connotation. It also studies the movement, volume, distribution, and quality of this water, as well as its direct or indirect influence on existing or planned structures in a given region (dams, underground or open-pit mines, buildings, tunnels, natural cavities, etc). Fonntes has the know-how to carry out studies involving hydrogeological mapping and numerical modelling. It has a multidisciplinary team to carry out these studies, involving biologists, geologists, hydrogeologists, hydrologists, and environmental and geotechnical engineers. The hydrogeological studies are carried out in three stages: • In the first stage, a systematic bibliographical survey of the study region is carried out, in which qualitative and quantitative data are collected on physiographic, geological, and geomorphological aspects. • In the second stage, fieldwork is carried out. • In the third stage, the data and surveys carried out in the field are compiled to create computer hydrogeological models, which are created using specific software.

Engineering projects for dams and earth massifs are developed for various purposes. Fonntes carries out tailings characterisation studies, and studies on tailings disposal methods (dams, tailings drying systems, thickened tailings disposal systems, and drained tailings stacking systems). It designs dam engineering projects, studies the geotechnical behaviour of tailings, water balance, water recycling, and conservation, as well as creating dam decommissioning projects. Based on the available theoretical and practical foundation, the study of the geotechnical behaviour of the tailings and the appropriate disposal methodology, short-, medium-, and long-term plans are drawn up, indicating the configurations, implementation phases, characterisation, and quantification of the necessary works, the investments required and the permits to be obtained.

Fonntes Geotécnica carries out everything from prospecting and geological-geotechnical investigations, such as auger, percussion, rotary and mixed drilling, DCP (Dynamic Cone Penetrometer), Shelby and Denison sampling, deformed and undeformed samples, to the installation of control instruments (surface markers, water level indicators, piezometers, and inclinometers) and their monitoring. Laboratory Tests: The Geotechnics Laboratory conducts tests in soil mechanics, rock mechanics, engineering geology, geotechnical monitoring and instrumentation, unsaturated soils, and environmental geotechnics. Soil characterisation is of fundamental importance for engineering works and projects, mainly because soils are heterogeneous, anisotropic, and non-linear materials. Sampling, conditioning, transport, sample preparation, and testing are all stages that must be carried out by trained and experienced professionals. We work with excellence in carrying out special geotechnical tests for the investigation and qualification of various types of soil used in construction work. Among the services provided are: • Taking deformed and undeformed samples. • Particle size analysis by sieving and sedimentation. • Determination of liquidity limit. • Determination of the plasticity limit. • Determination of the specific mass of grains. • Determination of the moisture content of soils. • Determination of the apparent specific mass of soils. • One-dimensional settlement. • California Bearing Ratio (CBR) tests. • Direct, slow, pre-compaction, and flooded shear. • Normal proctor compaction test. • Triaxial tests.