SNC-Lavalin wins top award from Consulting Engineers of B.C.

Sustainability was a dominant characteristic of the projects that won British Columbia’s 2010 Awards for Engineering Excellence. The awards were celebrated on Saturday night, April 24, at the Westin Bayshore hotel in Vancouver by Consulting Engineers of B.C.
Chosen from 45 entries, the winning projects included Olympic venues, hydro-electric facilities, rapid transit, and two international projects. SNC-Lavalin won the top award – the Lieutenant Governor’s Award — for the $1.9 billion Canada Line Rapid Transit Project.
The awards of excellence included North America’s first untreated sewage-heat-recovery based thermal plant, the world’s first offshore liquefied natural gas receiving and re-gasification terminal and the first of its kind flood debris barrier.
Mike Currie, President of Consulting Engineers of B.C. (CEBC), said: “Imagine a world without running water, roads or electricity. So many aspects of our daily lives depend on engineers.”
Currie also noted that B.C.’s engineering sector makes a $2 billion contribution to the provincial economy and is increasingly in demand internationally. He also said “It’s great to see that sustainability is a key component of so many diverse projects.”
Following is a list of the award-winners, which were given in five categories.

LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR’S AWARD & AWARD OF EXCELLENCE
Canada Line Rapid Transit Project, Richmond, B.C. (transportation)
SNC-Lavalin Inc.
* The $1.9 billion Canada Line Rapid Transit Project is an 18.5-km rapid transit line that incorporates 16 stations in complex urban networks using elevated, underground, and at-grade components. A 2.5-km bored tunnel passes under downtown high-rise buildings, and three stations are integrated into existing buildings. An elevated guideway through Richmond helped shape No.3 Road’s new street vision. Delivered 110 days ahead of schedule, the Canada Line Rapid Transit Project has surpassed expectations with a system reliability of 98.9 percent and estimated greenhouse gas emission reductions of 20 to 27 kilotonnes per year.

AWARDS OF EXCELLENCE
Richmond Olympic Oval Roof, Richmond, B.C. (buildings)
Fast + Epp Structural Engineers
* Long-span timber-steel hybrid arches, a world first, support ‘wood wave’ panels that capture the attention of visitors. The structure conceals mechanical and electrical services, creating a striking, uncluttered architectural expression. The wave panels, constructed with pine beetle kill 2 x 4s, sustainably and economically respond to the epidemic in BC’s forests. The panel structure yields outstanding acoustic performance, and the roof has also been recognized with national and international awards.

False Creek Energy Centre, Vancouver (municipal)
Sandwell Engineering Inc.
* North America’s first untreated sewage-heat-recovery based thermal plant, the False Creek Energy Centre will deliver up to 34 MW of thermal energy to Southeast False Creek. Located underneath the Cambie Street Bridge, the facility is largely below-grade and obtains 70 percent of its thermal energy from sewage heat recovery. Exhaust flues were designed to look like a stainless steel hand rising beside the bridge deck, including LED fingernails that change colour to depict energy demand – reminding residents about conservation.

Adriatic Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) Terminal: Internal Storage Tanks, Porto Levante, Italy (natural resources, energy & industry)
Ausenco Sandwell
* Located 15 km off Italy’s east coast, this project is the world’s first offshore liquefied natural gas-receiving and re-gasification terminal. The terminal is a gravity-based concrete structure, housing two 125,000 m3 steel LNG storage tanks, each 155m long. Fabricated in Korea and assembled in Spain, the first-of-their-kind steel tanks handle temperatures ranging from -165° to +20° C. The design ensures fatigue resistance against millions of cumulative load cycles from transportation, emptying and filling, plus earthquakes.

Pilot Test Program for Simultaneous Phosphorus and Carbon Recover from City of Salmon Arm WWPC, B.C. (soft engineering)
Dayton & Knight Ltd.
* Wastewater treatment plants commonly experience problems with struvite – a chemical compound that naturally forms crystals in wastewater – accumulating in equipment and piping, causing operational issues. Sewage treatment plants with biological nutrient removal abilities typically require a carbon source, and one potential source is volatile fatty acids (VFAs). The pilot program demonstrates the ability to recover both phosphorus and VFA (carbon) using an autothermal thermophilic aerobic digestion (sludge digestion) process and a struvite crystallizer. Targets were surpassed by removing 80 percent of the phosphorus and 35 percent of the ammonium, and high quality crystals were produced – demonstrating the project’s ability to recover valuable resources from a waste stream while eliminating the need for metal salts.

AWARDS OF MERIT
Hillcrest Curling Rink and Percy Norman Aquatic Centre, Vancouver (buildings)
Stantec Consulting Ltd.

Fitzsimmons Creek Debris Barrier, Whistler, B.C. (municipal)
Kerr Wood Leidal Associates and Gygax Engineering Associates Ltd.

Seymour Capilano Filtration Plant, North Vancouver (municipal)
SSBV Consultants Inc. (Stantec Consulting, AMEC and Black & Veatch)

Roadways Linking Communities: The Golden Ears Bridge Project, Langley to Maple Ridge, B.C. (transportation)
McElhanney Consulting Services Ltd.

Pitt River Bridge and Mary Hill Interchange Design-Build Project, Port Coquitlam, B.C. (transportation)
MMM Group Limited with Associated Engineering Ltd.

Ashlu Creek Hydroelectric Project, Squamish, B.C. (natural resources, energy and industry)
Golder Associates Ltd. with Hatch Mott MacDonald and RSW Inc.

Nam Theun 2 1074 MW Hydro Project, Laos, SE Asia (natural resources, energy & industry)
Klohn Crippen Berger

Thinking Outside the Dike: Cowichan Valley Integrated Flood Management Plan, Vancouver Island (soft engineering)
Northwest Hydraulic Consultants