From left: Stantec general manager – water David Hogg, Beca group director – utilities Clive Rundle, Watercare chief infrastructure officer Steve Webster, WSP water director Carl Devereux, and Aurecon major projects director Matt Flannery.
We are welcoming four new partners who will provide strategy, planning and design expertise to help us meet our targets for carbon reduction, cost efficiency and health and safety on our infrastructure projects over the next 10 years.
At a pōwhiri held at our head office in Auckland today, our chief infrastructure officer Steve Webster signed contracts with strategy and planning partners, Aurecon and Stantec, and design delivery partners Beca and WSP.
Webster says bringing the new partners on board is a key part of the company’s Enterprise Model approach to infrastructure delivery, which has seen us working closely with its construction partners Fletcher and Fulton Hogan for the past three years.
“Signing up for a 10-year partnership means we’re providing the certainty our partners need to plan their resourcing, develop talent and invest in innovation and new technology. This in turn allows us to deliver the best water and wastewater infrastructure for our people, our customers and the environment.
“Over the next 10 years, we expect to spend more than $9b on water and wastewater infrastructure, and we have a responsibility to our customers to spend every dollar wisely. Our partners will help us to do that.”
“They’ll be working on large-scale projects like the North Harbour 2 watermain, which will service growing communities in the north and west, and investigating thermal hydrolysis at our wastewater treatment plants at M
āngere and Rosedale.
“Just like our construction partners, our planning and design partners will work collaboratively with us to help us achieve our ambitious targets for reducing build carbon, reducing costs and improving health, safety and wellbeing outcomes for everyone working on our sites,” Webster says. “They also share our commitment to advancing outcomes for M
āori by building meaningful relationships, developing our works programme in partnership with mana whenua and establishing employment and education pathways.”
Stantec general manager – water David Hogg greets our poutiaki tikanga Maori Richie Waiwai at the powhiri at our Newmarket head office.
The targets are to:
- reduce carbon in infrastructure by 40 per cent by 2025
- reduce the cost to deliver our infrastructure programme by 20 per cent by 2024
- improve the health, safety and well-being of all people involved in delivering our infrastructure by 20 per cent year on year.
Representatives from our partners will be collocated at our head office, to foster collaboration and connected thinking.
“This is a collaborative model instead of the traditional competitive model,” Webster says. “We’ve already seen real benefits through working more closely – both physically and figuratively – with our construction partners. We have made both carbon and costs savings in pump station construction, implemented digital enhancements that have supported cost reductions, safety, and constructability, and increased our off-site manufacture to improve wellbeing, safety and quality.
“We’re now going to be seeing the benefits of this collaboration right from the feasibility and design stage through to a project’s construction delivery and operational handover.”
The consultants selected have both local knowledge and a global reach.
“These companies already work closely with other utilities around the world, which allows us to tap into their people, experience and valuable global insights.”
Our poutiaki tikanga Maori Richie Waiwai at the powhiri at Watercare’s Newmarket head office.