North Wales firm scores highest ever mark in UK in civil engineering sustainability scheme23rd Mar 2009

North Wales firm Jones Bros has achieved the highest ever mark in the UK in an important environmental quality assessment by a top industry body.

The ‘excellent’ 94.6 per cent score was secured in the prestigious Civil Engineering Environmental Quality Assessment and Award Scheme, CEEQUAL.

It was awarded for Jones Bros’ work on an £8.5m contract to provide infrastructure for a £13m business park development at Parc Cybi, Anglesey.

The award scheme, backed by the Institution of Civil Engineers, aims to improve sustainability of civil engineering and public realm projects. Jones Bros was assessed on many aspects of its environmental and social performance on the project, including use of materials, waste minimisation, reduction of carbon emissions, community relations, land use and ecology.
CEEQUAL chief executive, Roger Venables, said: “Our threshold for Excellent CEEQUAL Awards is 75 per cent, so any score above 90 per cent is exceptional. Only seven out of 51 Awards made so far have scored above 90 per cent. No other firm has achieved the level Jones Bros attained since the scheme’s launch – it is one per cent higher than the previous highest.”

Jones Bros contract manager Hefin Lloyd-Davies “This achievement is a tremendous boost to the team who worked on site. It will also be invaluable when we tender for new business
“The company policy is to prioritise sustainability wherever possible across all of our work. As part of this policy we are developing a niche as balance of plant providers for renewables projects, including the Crystal Rig II wind farm in Dunbar.”

As part of its sustainability drive, Jones Bros won and processed a total of 120,000 tonnes of materials excavated during the construction, to reuse in the roads it built for the project. This saved 12,000 lorry movements on the B4545 and other local roads.

Before work began, the plans for the scheme also went through the value engineering process, enabling Jones Bros’ experts to suggest ways to reduce building costs while maintaining the integrity of the overall plan, quality of materials and work.

This shaved £650,000 off the £8.5m contract, to construct the infrastructure at the 120-acre enterprise, residential and retail development site.

The savings were achieved despite working around a team of up to 45 archaeologists, who started excavating following the discovery of artefacts dating back several centuries.
Parc Cybi, formerly known as Ty Mawr, has been identified as a major strategic business investment site for North West Wales.

The Welsh Assembly Government (WAG) is investing £13m in the land purchase scheme and infrastructure works, which aims to create up to 1,300 jobs.

Other partners alongside WAG in the project are Atkins Consultants.
For further information about the awards, visit www.ceequal.com.