At the Advanced Work Packaging Conference 2015 held recently in Houston, leaders from global energy, EPC and chemical companies shared their experiences with advanced work packaging (AWP) and workface planning (WFP), and how it has impacted their companies’ success.
Moderated by Lloyd Rankin, president of Ascension Systems Inc. (producer of the conference), the panel featured Southern Co. Project Engineer Supervisor Jose L. LaRota, ExxonMobil Senior Construction Consultant James N. Mayeaux and Fluor Global Construction Services Director Scott Hounsell.
Q: What are the challenges that are preventing widespread adoption of AWP?
HOUNSELL: Resistance to change. I don’t think there’s anything bigger than that right now in our industry. But as a best practice, it gives me a “stick” to influence our internal parties that are resisting. It’s got some weight behind it and will get more visibility.
MAYEAUX: One of the things we need to do as professionals is to make sure we’re documenting what we do very well and what the benefit of that is. Then we have the obligation to share that appropriately to change those perceptions. That’s our job. There’s too much of a prize potential out there for us not to do that.
Q: What is your company’s success with AWP and WFP implementation?
MAYEAUX: Within ExxonMobil, one of the projects that used AWP in its entirety was in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The project manager attributes about 5-percent savings in total installed costs to the use of AWP programs, which is a tremendous success. We’ve also experienced improvement on the safety side, which creates a better culture to work in.
Q: What does early contractor engagement mean?
HOUNSELL: It means you have the right people and the right number of people providing support. It means you’ve got your full team — engineering, procurement, fabrication and construction — integrated and working together. That’s really when you get the benefits on early contract engagement.
Q: Does early planning limit flexibility in the future for contractors?
LAROTA: I don’t think it does. I think you can make the argument if you’re doing a lot of the early planning for a contractor, you’re getting into his work methods and his knowledge of how to plan his work. We have very good planners from a construction perspective. They know the area, they know our labor situation, and they know where the equipment and the resources are. We have confidence we can plan our work properly, so that shouldn’t limit the flexibility of the contractors on the back end.
MAYEAUX: There’s going to be some limitations on what the construction contractor can influence. Some of the projects we’re working on now, we’re in the very pre-front-end engineering and design (FEED). But we’re going to make decisions on modulization. We’re going to make decisions on where those split, on what goes where and what the sequence of work is going to be long before we go into pre-FEED or FEED. We do a lot of internal construction planning long before we engage in FEED, much less before we are in detail design.
HOUNSELL: I don’t think it limits flexibility. I think it can probably be used as a scapegoat very easily, depending on what the issues are. The people who make decisions on modularization — where you’re going to do it and in what areas — have enough knowledge of the industry. The good contractor’s job is to accept that and to work with the client to make the project successful.
For more information, visit www.AWPConference.com or call (403) 453-1916.
