Pell Frischmann in $700m Iraq water system design

Pell Frischmann, one of the UK's leading engineering, development and management consultancies, said it has completed the design of a $700-million water infrastructure rehabilitation project in Iraq with the help of Aconex, a major provider of the global platform connecting teams on construction and engineering projects. The Water Supply Sector Loan Project involves refurbishing aging facilities and building new infrastructure to support the public health of residents in the Ninewa, Anbar and Salah El Din governorates of Iraq. Pell Frischmann pointed out that the entire water system had been long overdue for a major upgrade. "The people here badly needed this system," remarked Stewart Neal, civil engineer at Pell Frischmann and design manager on the project. "Since water demand exceeded supply, water would be turned on for 24 hours in one zone of a city, and the next day water would be turned off in that zone and directed to another zone. The intermittent water supply and low water quality created public health risks," stated Neal. In 2012, the Iraqi Ministry of Municipalities and Public Works utilised financing from the Japan International Co-operation Agency (JICA) for the redesign and reconstruction of water intake facilities, water treatment plants, transmission facilities, and distribution pipelines. Following an international tendering process, the ministry awarded the design project to Pell Frischmann. Active in Iraq since 2004, the firm had won the British Expertise International Masterplanning Project of the Year Award in 2017 for its collaborative work on the country’s transportation infrastructure. With design teams in Exeter and London (UK), Baghdad (Iraq) and Mumbai (India) and a client in Iraq with an unreliable IT infrastructure and security issues, Pell Frischmann knew the project would present challenges. The firm selected the Aconex platform to be able to store, access and share design data securely in the cloud, manage complex design reviews, track approvals, and keep all communications and processes connected to the project rather than lost on email or internal servers, said Neal. Even then, Aconex helped Pell Frischmann quickly avert problems that the firm could not have anticipated. “We found that the client preferred to review and approve designs on paper,” explained Neal. “Sending design documents by mail or courier was expensive and time-consuming. File sizes and regional connectivity issues made email impractical,” he added. Aconex solved the problem with project-wide collaboration, connecting the entire team and all project data on a single platform. The design phase of the project was completed on schedule due to the visibility and control Aconex gave Pell Frischmann," said Neal. "There was never any ambiguity about who was holding up the workflow. Everyone could see who had approved designs, where the bottlenecks were and who needed to take action," he added. On the achievement, Steve Cooper, the general manager, UK and Ireland, at Aconex, said the Iraqi water system design was yet another example of its leadership in Middle East infrastructure projects across multiple sectors. "We are pleased with the opportunity to deliver value to Pell Frischmann and its project team, and we look forward to supporting the firm with similar projects in the future,"