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Milestones
WATER PROJECT COMPLETION
SCOTLAND—A Bechtel-led joint venture has completed design and construction of the $100 million Moray Coast wastewater project in Northern Scotland. The project covers almost 100 kilometers of coastline and entailed construction of three wastewater treatment works, a sludge treatment center, 23 pumping stations, two long-sea outfalls, and more than 40 kilometers of sewer. The joint venture has built two other projects for customer Scottish Water.
PEASE RELEASE
Ukraine—Late last year, an arc of 30 doves was released to mark the completion of more than seven years of work by Bechtel to decommission nuclear missile launching facilities in Ukraine—and as a symbol of hope for continuing peace. In the company of Ukrainian and U.S. officials, Bechtel employees commemorated the covering of the last of 176 intercontinental ballistic missile silos and 17 launch control centers near Khmelnitsky and Pervomaysk. Bechtel has been involved in many weapons-elimination projects since the breakup of the Soviet Union, under contracts awarded by the U.S. Defense Threat Reduction Agency.
LOW-EMISSION POWER PLANT
AUSTRALIA—Bechtel has completed an 840-megawatt coal-fired power plant southwest of Brisbane. The Millmerran facility is among the first in Australia to use low-sulfur coal in combination with a super-critical boiler technology and an air cooling system design that produces the lowest greenhouse gas emissions of any conventional coal-fired systems. The project majority owner is InterGen, a Bechtel-Shell venture.
AIRPORT AGREEMENT
NETHERLANDS ANTILLES—A consortium led by Bechtel Enterprises affiliate Alterra Partners has signed a 30-year concession agreement to develop and operate Curaçao International Airport. Under the agreement, Alterra will design and construct a new passenger terminal with an annual capacity of 1.6 million passengers and will source, train, and develop airport staff. The consortium also includes Trabajos Industriales y Mecánicos, C.A. and Janssen de Jong.
PRESIDENTIAL APPOINTMENT
USA—President Bush has appointed Bechtel Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Riley Bechtel to the President’s Export Council. The Council advises on government policies and programs affecting U.S. trade and promotes export expansion. It also provides a forum for resolving trade-related problems among business, agriculture, labor, and government.
SAFETY FIRST
- RAIL PROJECT, USA
A Bechtel joint venture providing program management services for the East Side Access rail-tunnel project in New York City has worked 1.2 million job hours without a lost-time accident. - FOSSIL POWER JOB, BRAZIL
Bechtel’s team at the Araucária power plant project has completed 1.9 million job hours without a lost-time accident. - WEAPONS DESTRUCTION, RUSSIA
Bechtel’s team designing and building facilities for storing fissile material from nuclear weapons has completed 6.6 million lost-time accident-free job hours. - PETROCHEMICALS PROJECT, CHINA
Bechtel’s team at the Nanhai petrochemicals project recently hit a significant safety milestone: 4 million job hours without a lost-time accident. - POWER PROJECT, SAUDI ARABIA
The team working on Phase 2 of the Shoaiba power plant project has completed more than 9.3 million job hours without a lost-time accident. - ENERGY SITE, USA
Savannah River Site construction forces recently completed 5.1 million job hours without a lost-time accident. - NUCLEAR PROJECT, USA
A Bechtel-led joint venture replacing a reactor pressure vessel at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station has completed 2.1 million safe work hours.
KEY WOMEN IN ENERGY
USA—Three Bechtel employees were honored recently for exceptional contributions by women to their companies, countries, or the energy marketplace. Katherine Gurun, senior vice president and general counsel of Bechtel Corporation, and Joanne White, Bechtel’s operations manager on a pipeline project in Azerbaijan, were among honorees in the Key Women in Energy Global 2002 Awards. Gurun was also honored at the Key Women in Energy-Americas awards, along with Manager of R&D and Technology Coordination Linda Trocki.
MOST RESPECTED COMPANY
ENGLAND—Corporate chief executives surveyed for a Financial Times/PricewaterhouseCoopers survey have named Bechtel as the “World’s Most Respected Company” in the property and construction field. More than 640 executives cited quality of management and financial performance as the leading reasons for their choices.
MANAGEMENT MOVES
Dan Chao has been assigned to lead Bechtel’s new strategic focus on greater China, including Hong Kong and Taiwan. He will also oversee Bechtel CITIC Engineering, Inc. and Pacific Engineers and Constructors, Ltd., respectively Bechtel’s Shanghai and Taiwan-based joint stock companies.
GAS PROJECT COMPLETION
TUNISIA—A Bechtel team has completed improvements to the Hannibal Root and Branch gas plant for BG Tunisia, within an aggressive 21-day schedule. The project included removal of two 80-tonne process columns. The plant processes sour gas from wells at BG’s Miskar facility 125 kilometers offshore, in the Mediterranean.
CHEMICAL AGENT-DESTRUCTION
USA—The U.S. Army has awarded a Bechtel-led team a 10-year, $1.5 billion contract to design, build, operate, and close a chemical agent-destruction facility in Colorado. The plant will eliminate 2,268 tonnes of agent stockpiled in artillery and mortar shells at the Pueblo Chemical Depot, using a water-based neutralization process. Construction will begin in 2004.
LNG CONTRACT
AUSTRALIA—Bechtel will perform engineering, procurement, and construction for a 3.24-million-tonne liquefied natural gas processing and exporting plant on Darwin Harbor, in Australia’s Northern Territory. The US$1 billion project also includes construction of a 1.5-kilometer jetty and an 188,000-cubic-meter storage tank. ConocoPhillips is majority partner in project owner Darwin LNG Pty. Ltd.
CLOSER—On the Road Again
In the 1930s, the U.S. National Parks Service rolled out a fleet of buses for touring parks in the mountainous West. The coaches featured a rollback canvas top and were an instant hit with park visitors. Most were gone by 1960, although some of the originals at Glacier National Park have been rebuilt and reinstated.
Now the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory is working with an auto maker to develop an alternative-fuel, low-emission replacement for year-round use, with a snow-track system replacing the wheels in winter. The latest prototype echoes the styling of the original masterpiece, but it’s fueled by natural gas. Other models may use compressed or liquefied natural gas, propane, or bio-diesel fuels with even greater fuel economy and range, and reduced emissions, noise, and vibration. If tests prove successful, production of a new fleet for the National Parks Service could begin next year.
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