- PO Box Z5328, Perth St Georges Terrace WA 6831
Sector: Engineering, Energy, Mining, Oil & Gas and Infrastructure
Client: Woodside LNG
Background
On this monumental project, MGA was engaged by a major resource exploration client processing gas from the offshore Pluto and Xena gas fields in Western Australia. The client was seeking to increase the extraction of LNG and required assistance from a quantity surveying contractor. All up, the MGA team assessed over 10,000 documents in the two-year duration of the project.
This client learned of our services by word-of-mouth. After reaching out to us, we put a proposal together for them to carry out the works and proceeded to assist on the project for two years. The exact scope of our assistance depended on the services our client required – as it was a joint venture, the client’s engineering partner was able to provide some estimating services, but required additional resources in specialised areas. In this case we worked client-side indirectly.
There were a few key reasons MGA was engaged for a solution by the client – aside from a good recommendation. Our WA-specific knowledge and our experience across other massive preliminary resource exploration projects was extremely beneficial to the client, as was our flexibility since we were able to function as an external auditor to complement our client’s engineering resource.
Additionally, on this $7.6 billion Australian dollar, 4.9 million tonne per annum gas field – there was simply a lot of work to do!
WHAT WE DID
MGA completed two key services on this project. The main offering was measuring Information For Tender (IFT) and Approved For Construction (AFC) drawings. The client originally had IFT drawings available that went for tender pricing. At this point, the IFT drawings only had about 60% of the process designed. The later-stage AFC drawings had 100% of the process designed and were issued as well. Our job at MGA was to find the differences between the preliminary IFT drawings and the final AFC drawings. Once found, we worked to verify the claims. Our next service was to produce IFT bills of quantity. These consisted of measured item lists for the job at hand, including steel work, pipe work, labour and work summaries for the client’s contractor to price and complete on-site. We also provided some ad-hoc work, including onsite Contract Administration staff, commercial claims and variation reviews.
There were no major integration or adoption challenges to consider in this project – to the point that one of the MGA staff was taken on by the client directly! We negotiated a deal with the client for our staff member to move on as they were willing to transfer and the client was impressed with their capability. We kept the process collaborative by working out of the client’s offices as well as our own and remaining responsive to whatever came down the pipeline. By taking on a flexible approach and scaling up or down as necessary, we managed to complete this monumental project as efficiently as possible.
HOW IT TURNED OUT
The implementation process for this task required MGA to go above and beyond the call of duty. There were approximately 10, 000 drawings to examine and a crew of 10-12 staff at the height of the engagement. That team had to adhere to aggressive timelines and work very well under pressure. While our engagement commenced in 2008 and was staggered throughout a 4-5 month period, MGA continued to engage with the client for the two consecutive years. We were also involved in finalising the end quantities with contractors in the case that they didn’t agree with our figures – we negotiated these so the client didn’t need to.
In the end, the client benefited from the level of accuracy gained in their project thanks to an engagement with MGA. They were confident they had achieved best value for the task at hand, with all 10,000 drawings assessed and additional services carried out at top-tier capacity and within the desired timeline.