Sellafield Box Encapsulation Plant Direct Import Facility

Close collaboration with our client, designers and other contractors helped achieve a significant site milestone 1 month early.

The project scope

Completion of critical construction works on the Sellafield nuclear licenced site using our team of security cleared workers to deliver the civil engineering construction works on the project – including the hardstanding areas, roads, footpaths, drainage works, BT communications ducting and inspection chambers. We established a project management team on site to manage and coordinate the works, which included:

• Site surveys and setting out
• Pouring of over 1000 m² of reinforced concrete for the hardstanding areas
• Laying over 600 tonnes of asphalt for the roads and footpaths
• Excavation and installation of 200 metres of foul drainage and associated inspection chambers
• Installation of 350 metres of new kerb lines
• Removal of over 1500 tonnes of waste material from site
• Installation of street lighting and CCTV columns
• Excavation and installation of 250 metres of BT communications ducting and associated chambers

Key quantities:

• Concrete: 1,000 m3
• Asphalt: 600 t
• Drainage: 200 m

Challenges & successes

Due to the urgency of the project, the design was developed by our client concurrently with construction. This required us to work in close collaboration with the client team to provide design solutions and innovations in order to maintain project progress. Also, due to the history of the project, the engineering records were not always up to date. To solve this problem, our engineers carried out site surveys, marked up drawings and documents, managed TQs and attended daily project coordination meetings to ensure all work was clarified and organised to ahead of schedule.

The complexity of the utilities supplies between facilities meant that obtaining isolations to carry out work was very challenging. To overcome this, we worked closely with our client and other contractors to plan isolations 12 weeks ahead and to carry out the works in as short timescale as possible due to site operational constraints.

In order to maintain the project schedule, we advised our client to use, and subsequently installed, the FP McCann ‘Easy Base’ pre-cast drainage system which saved several weeks on the construction schedule.