Project Description
The James Hutton Institute is located within the outskirts of Invergowrie to the South of Dundee. The extensive campus of storage, research and analytical facilities are surrounded by fertile production field allowing the Institute to conduct excellent science-based crop production techniques. Their vision is to be at the forefront of innovative science for sustainable management of land, crop and natural resources whilst connecting the land with the people.
International Barley Hub (IBH)
The IBH is the first project in a series of commercially focussed innovation hubs. It will be a unique platform for the translation of barley research into commercial benefits for the entire brewing, whisky and food value chain.
This purpose-built building will house visitor/conferencing facilities, laboratory research, administration and staff ancillary support areas.
Advanced Plant Growth Centre (APGC)
APGC aims to deliver increased commercial, economic and environmental benefits to the agricultural, food and drink sectors in the UK and internationally, by innovative use of precision-controlled environmental technologies.
This purpose-built facility will be conjoined to the IBH and will share common staff ancillary support areas whilst providing the necessary phenotyping, growth towers and controlled environment required to support their frontier research.
Both facilities above are part of a campus-wide development supported by The Tay Cities Deal (TCD). Several existing buildings require to be demolished to make way for new buildings or to be refurbished for re-purposing. The new steel-framed, metal clad building will feature main elevation glazing whilst internally modern open-plan and hub-style offices allow for flexible/collaborative ways of working. Roof mounted plant will serve both IBH and APGC buildings providing efficiencies, whilst ground-source heat pumps will contribute to the environmental credentials.
These highly services buildings provide the laboratory equipment and environment that underpin ground-breaking research undertaken by students at local Universities from Perth, Dundee and Edinburgh. The International recognition of the Institute is also supported by collaboration and knowledge sharing with over twenty countries.
Our Role / Scope
Full Quantity Surveying / Cost Management Services including;
- cost advice and cost planning
- assisting SCAPE Construction Delivery Partner to procure Work Packages
- risk management
- value engineering
and full post contract services of
- preparing monthly Interim Valuations and
- monthly cost reporting
- agreeing Change Control costs using NEC process
- agreeing the Final Account with the Contractor
D+S ensures that at all stages the procurement reporting and award process is robust and fully compliant with Public Procurement Regulations
The D+S team comprises a Project Director, a Project Quantity Surveyor and an Assistant Quantity Surveyor. These were augmented by other team members as and when appropriate; e.g. during production of Tender documents, or when significant remeasurement or assessments of claimed variations were required (post contract).
Benefits To Client
We were able to use our knowledge of working in previous situations to ensure adequate allowance was made in the Cost Plan with tender documentation being suitably detailed with sufficient information for all parties to understand complexities.
The combination of understanding the nature of the demolition, decanting and new build works has allowed for robust Cost Planning. Using stringent a Change Control process we anticipate the overall project to be delivered within budget.
A detailed Life Cycle Cost exercise, a requirement of the Tay City Deal, has been carried out as part of the design development process, assisting in the selection of appropriate external fabric materials and MEP systems.
Providing temporary and permanent facilities for decanted staff prior to buildings being demolished all had to be programmed and closely monitored to ensure abortive work was avoided and staff could provide business continuity.
As procurement was via Design and Build contracts thorough interrogation of the design information is required as it is imperative that all aspects of the Works are as detailed as possible. This ensures tender returns are competitive, complete and not over-loaded with risk. Our technical understanding of the details behind construction and MEP systems is extensive and is invaluable when managing costs for clients.
Our expertise in reviewing demolition and decanting strategies allowed suitable costs and programme time to be included in the project budget. By expressing and quantifying these prior to being transferred to the Contractor allowed risks to be minimised and tender cost returns not to be over-inflated.
The new buildings provide modern highly-serviced facilities with anti-vibration structures for labs, etc. The importance of a well co-ordinated designs is paramount to promoting efficiencies and clash avoidance. This was facilitated by the use Viewpoint Electronic Document Interchange (EDI) system, the chosen Common Data Environment.