Clean-up of Saint John Harbour wins one of ACEC-New Brunswick awards

The Association of Consulting Engineering Companies – New Brunswick (ACEC-NB) held its annual awards gala on April 10 in Fredericton. Five projects won Awards for Engineering Excellence out of 14 nominees.

The awards are the highest recognition for the New Brunswick consulting engineering industry. Chair of the judging panel this year was Darin Lamont, P.Eng., vice-president of engineering and operations at Saint John Energy.

Said Lamont: “All of these projects provide great value to the citizens and the economy. The projects represent the various aspects of our society and keeps us moving in a forward direction.”

Following are the award-winning projects:

– Dr. Georges-L.-Dumont Hospital – Energy Centre, Moncton by MCW Maricor (buildings category).

The Energy Centre is a new power plant to replace the aging existing plant on campus. It houses the hot and cold energy generating systems for the entire Health Care campus, as well as a new emergency power generating system. The centre is located at the extreme end of the campus and connected via a 1,300-ft. tunnel to the main Hospital.

– Charlottetown Airport Authority Runway 10-28 Rehabilitation, P.E.I. by Hatch Mott MacDonald (transportation category).

Runway 10-28 is a secondary runway that had not received a major rehabilitation for more than 25 years. Besides rehabilitating the runway surface asphalt and improving the runway grades, the project added new runway approach lighting and a modern airfield control system.

– Saint John Harbour Clean-Up by CBCL and Crandall Engineering (municipal-civil category).

Approximately 23 million litres per day of untreated wastewater was being discharged to the Saint John Harbour. By the end of this four year project, the untreated wastewater flow will have been virtually eliminated. The $33-million project involved 21 lift stations, 8.7 kilometres of gravity sewer pipes and 9.2 kilometres of sanitary sewer force mains.

– PowerShift Atlantic Project by Stantec (industrial-energy category).

PowerShift Atlantic is a collaborative research and demonstration project to find more effective ways of integrating wind energy into the Maritimes electricity systems. Led by NB Power and other partners, the project demonstrates “intelligent load management” and improved wind forecasting tools to regulate customer loads and shift energy consumption. Stantec Consulting, with the help of sub-consultants SAIC and Accreon, is leading the project management. Stantec is also providing technological oversight and engineering design services.

– Village de Cap-Pele Environmental Protection by Crandall Engineering and Village de Cap-Pelé (environmental-society category).

This project focused on upgrading the existing aerated wastewater treatment facility to meet new federal regulations and to treat incoming wastes from seafood processing plants in order to protect the fishing and recreational environment in the Northumberland Strait. A retention pond was part of the project’s mitigation measures.

ACEC-NB firms employ a total of 1,200 staff and complete approximately $1 billion in capital construction projects annually.