Kluwer Construction Blog

The inaugural Youth Olympic Games hosted by Singapore in August last year left a positive impression on Singapore’s young guests. The fanfare would have been much bigger had the Singapore Sports Hub been available for the event.

At an estimated cost of S$1.33 billion, the new Sports Hub will boast a 55,000-seater retractable roof stadium, a 6,000-capacity Indoor Aquatic Centre, a 3,000-capacity Multi-Purpose Arena and a Water Sports Centre.

Despite the tender being awarded by the Singapore government in 2008, the PPP project commenced construction only in September 2010 – the result of delays from the 2008-2009 global financial crisis and high construction costs. It is now expected to [...]

I am a consultant and the appointed “Engineer” working on a harbour construction project in Eastern Asia, using the FIDIC Yellow (Design & Build) Book. Some confusion has arisen over the interpretation of Provisional Sums and reasonable profit.

It seems there is no escaping the football. I’ve come to the FIDIC International Contract Users’ Conference 2010, being held in Beijing this week, for my routine update on the federation’s standard form publishing and training efforts. Now, one might expect that given China’s national team are not a feature of a certain international football tournament taking place in South Africa, Beijing might be the place to get away from the current hysteria gripping those among the human race who are privileged enough to have access to a television that screens the football. Well, for good or ill, one would be wrong.

Under both the contractual process and subsequent formal dispute resolution proceedings, contemporary records form a critical part of the evidence to be utilised in evaluating the contractual entitlement. The importance of good record keeping – by both contractors and employer’s agents or engineers—cannot be overstated.

I am a contractor working on a wastewater project in Eastern Europe, using the FIDIC Yellow Book –Design & Build. Vol.3 of our contract contains the following clause:

“Tests on Completion

The first 30 days shall be a monitoring period during which the Contractor sets up the operation of the plant and conducts his own water quality tests to confirm that the final effluent consent has been met. At the end of this period the Contractor shall notify the Engineer that the plant is complete and meeting the Process Guarantee which then shall be met by a further 30 consecutive days before Taking Over can take place.”

We have met the final 30 consec [...]

I thought that I would hail in the new year with an update on some interesting construction developments. Put it down to a period of reflection over the Christmas break! As I want to cover a number of areas, I have split this update into 2 postings.

In this first update, I am going to cover the latest FIDIC news and the new Bribery Bill currently going through the UK parliament. In my next posting I will look at two recent construction cases in English law, the first covering recoverability of damages and the English “remoteness” rule, the second covering treatment of contractual notice bars for claims.

In the wake of the current downturn, employers will increasingly look for greater budget certainty under EPC or Turnkey contracts. This is where the contractor undertakes all tasks – design, construction, management etc – so that, upon completion, the employer merely needs to ‘turn the key’ and operation of the plant or building can begin immediately. The whole point is that the contractor assumes price risk in return for relative autonomy over how he delivers the project – provided of course he meets the employer’s output requirements. But often employers want not just price certainty but also to retain control over design approval and how the project is actually delivered. This can [...]