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Leighton Holdings Quarterly Update 2nd Quarter 24 Brian Gillon, Project Director Work resumes at Leighton Asia's Aviation Fuel Supply Facility project The new aviation fuel supply facility augments the existing fuel supply to the Chek Lap Kok airport in Hong Kong which was built by Leighton Asia over ten years ago. The new facility will receive tankers direct from the Middle East of up to 80,000 tonnes. Brian Gillon, Project Director of the Aviation Fuel Supply Facility speaks about the project. "The first part of the project is a 650m long jetty with two berths, one for vessels up to 80,000 tonnes and the second for vessels up to 40,000 tonnes. Fuel will be offloaded along the jetty into another part of the project, a tank farm with an initial capacity of 140 million litres of fuel. The fuel is stored here, certified and then pumped via a pair of new submarine pipe-lines, 4.5km long, to an existing pipeline and then on to the existing aviation fuel facility. "Our client is ECO Aviation Fuel Development Limited, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Hong Kong and China Gas Company Limited. ECO has a franchise agreement with the Airport Authority Hong Kong to build and operate this facility to provide fuel. "The project value is in excess of A$100m. We were initially awarded the project nearly 6 years ago, however, some of the project's neighbours were uncomfortable with having a fuel facility nearby and lodged a number of protests resulting in delays to the project. Ultimately the environmental permit was revoked, requiring the Airport Authority Hong Kong to gain a second environmental permit. We have been on-site since last year and anticipate completion in the fourth quarter of 2009. "In terms of safety the real challenge on this project is the diversity of the work. We're working offshore on a jetty structure, doing piling work
Leighton Holdings Quarterly Update 2nd Quarter 25 over water as well as working on the tank farm. The tanks are 43.5m in diameter and 24.7m high, so we have the hazard of working at height. Later on we have piping and concrete work, and a submarine pipeline to install. "One of the things that we've done differently on this project is to divide our staff up into teams and each day we have one team go out onto site and do a safety inspection. They have specific items to look at each day. The site inspection teams encompass everybody, the draftsman, the quantity surveyors, the engineers, everybody. The people who wouldn't normally get out on site to look at safety specifically are going out with a fresh set of eyes to help the field team. "One of the particular challenges that we have in terms of safety on this project is crossing a very busy shipping channel known as Urmston Road. Urmston Road has a lot of river traffic coming from China into Hong Kong. To avoid the necessity for our pipe-laying barge to cross Urmston Road and interface with extremely heavy marine traffic, we're proposing to place the barge 2km offshore and then do a bottom pull of the pipe-line along the sea bed to the tank farm. "While the project is located in a primarily industrial area we do have a community liaison group visiting the project every quarter to go over the progress of the works and, in particular, the safety features of the project. Whilst I don't speak Cantonese, the community group does seem to appreciate the fact that I take the time to introduce the project, the members of our team and the progress that we've made to date on the project. "The project is located in an industrial area and the environmental impact of the project is quite small, but there is a unique feature environmentally - the jetty area is the habitat of the Chinese white dolphin. While the dolphins don't have any particular interest in our jetty they are particularly sensitive to underwater noise. In the construction of the jetty we use hydraulic hammers to drive the piles which causes considerable underwater noise. On the first Aviation Fuel Facility project, ten years ago, we used what was called a bubble curtain to reduce the noise. We have gone one step further on this particular project and we have developed a bubble jacket which is effectively a sleeve that goes over the outside of the pile. We inject compressed air at the base of the pile and this has the effect of reducing the underwater noise. We did considerable monitoring during a test phase prior to construction to ensure that we were having as little impact as possible on the dolphins as far as underwater noise goes. "Also we had to do a very detailed investigation along the route of the offshore pipeline to identify contaminated soils. There is natural contamination in some of the soil and it's necessary for us to dispose of that soil. We're now in the process of removing specific layers of dredged material and disposing of it in dedicated sites in Hong Kong. "Ultimately the success of the project for us is to send everybody home safely each night and to finish the project on time and within budget. "At the completion of this project we will have built the most up to date aviation fuel facility of any airport in the world," concluded Mr Gillon.
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PDF - 5.5 MB - Leighton Holdings

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