North West Gas Alliance
Client: Balfour Beatty Management
Date: 2005 - 2006
Project Value: £80m per annum
Timescale: 10 months
Services Provided:
- Project Planning
Project Overview:
The National Grid is one of the largest investor-owned energy companies in the world, providing energy to millions of customers across Great Britain and the Northeast US. In 2005, the National Grid awarded a number of major regional contracts for the rehabilitation and replacement of gas mains throughout the United Kingdom The contracts were in direct response to pressure from the Regulator to replace old cast iron mains throughout the local distribution network, particularly where there was evidence of deteriorating pipe work.
Following the de-merging and merging around BG plc, Transco and the Lattice Group, National Grid found itself in ownership of all the direct labour and management responsible for repair and maintenance of the network. On a regional basis, it was this management and labour that was integrated with a 3rd party contractor to form an Alliance or Partnership.
The contract for the North West Region of England was let to Balfour Beatty in early 2005 following a EU tendering process. The contract was to run for 5 years with an option for extending.
Delivery:
Schofield Lothian were brought in, late summer 2005 to provide urgent assistance with the overall project planning. In particular, a compliant programme needed to be established and designed to the specific requirements of the contract.
In the first instance, we deployed a Planning Manager within two weeks of the initial call tasked with assessing the requirements of the project. Following this initial assessment, we deployed additional planning resources, both senior and junior, to work in North West Alliance’s main office in Bolton.
The client was striving for uniformity of planning and reporting across all regions and Alliances. The problem lay in P3e (Primavera Project Management Electronic Planning) tool, which had been started, but was not compliant with the requirements of the clients existing systems. The issues were of such a fundamental nature; they threatened the existing programme even meeting the remit of the contract.
In response, an agreement was reached with the Alliance to create a new programme, built to the exact requirements of the contract. In the short term, the original programme was maintained to allow reporting to be continued.
Working closely with the Alliance team and the National Grid central planning team, the new programme was built and populated in 4 months. Following the new programmes completion, the original programme was discontinued. The team then engaged with the various operational departments to monitor progress and provide updates, while providing and enhancing the various reports that were needed to meet both users and clients needs.
Finally, in line with the original agreement with Balfour Beatty, the team were progressively disengaged whilst training new Balfour planners to take over the monitoring and reporting.
Benefits to the Client:
At an early stage, we established visibility to the cost of the commission by provided a price for undertaking the original engagement based upon the scope determined by our Planning Manager. Balfour Beatty also benefited from the experience and expertise of the Schofield Lothian team, which in turn enhanced Balfour’s position with their client.