PREMIER FOODS PLANT, TEESIDE


UK A MAJOR EXPANSION AT A FACTORY IN STOCKTON-ON-TEES GAVE WSP CEL A CHANCE TO DEMONSTRATE SOME SERIOUS ENGINEERING SKILL IN CLOSE COLLABORATION WITH THE CLIENT AND SUPPLY CHAIN.


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It was very much a team effort with the whole supply chain. It was a fairly congested workspace with multiple trades working in one area, but we had a very good safety record – more than 100,000 man-hours with no lost-time accidents.


Brian Parker, Senior Project Manager, WSP CEL


WSP CEL was responsible for delivering a £33m upgrade to Premier Foods’ Billingham facility, in Stockton-on-Tees, to increase the capacity of a plant manufacturing the meat-free protein Quorn.The WSP CEL team was involved in creating the initial concept strategy and in the detailed design for the installation of new equipment, in procuring components and construction contracts, and then in project managing the construction work itself.


“We were the lead on the entire project, and the client themselves had a very small project team,” says Brian Parker, Senior Project Manager at WSP CEL. “That meant we had to work very closely with them to make sure we didn’t swamp them with requests for information.The feedback we had was that we integrated really well.”


The design was based on an existing facility that was more than a decade old, but WSP CEL incorporated numerous improvements to accommodate modern equipment and techniques.The sheer size of some of the equipment called for detailed planning. “The fermentation tank is over 30m tall and stands in a tower that’s 10 storeys high,” explains Parker. “The vessel itself cost £1m and took a year to manufacture.Getting it into


place involved a major crane lift, and we also had to time the construction to make sure the building was at the right stage when it was ready. We built it in such a way so that if the vessel was slightly late or early, it wouldn’t hold up the project. That took a lot of planning.”


38M


Height of main fermenter vessel


QUICKFACTS


CLIENT Premier Foods PROJECT TEAM WSP office: WSP CEL PROJECT VALUE £33m


SERVICES PROVIDED Feasibility and concept study, detailed design, procurement and construction management STATUS First stage complete 2009


PROJECT SUMMARY New fermentation capacity, new media preparation and sterilisation, and downstream processing plant and equipment as well as upgrade of an existing effluent treatment plant.


Supervision of demolition contractor, undertaking demolition of an adjacent process building


KEY CHALLENGES To facilitate the upgrade and ensure production was back on line without any disruption during the shutdown


Image courtesy of George Todd


www.wspgroup.com


INDUSTRY


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