DEVRO

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DEVRO

Role of GWA, Inc. in the Project

As the electrical engineer of record for this project, GWA, Inc. was in a rather unique position as we were brought to the project by the General Contractor during the preliminary design phase. Our contract was then transferred to the Structural Engineer, who was contracted directly with Devro based on a prior relationship. During the duration of the project, we provided structured cabling design engineering under a contract directly with Devro, worked for the Architect for the fit-up of the second floor into an executive office suite and for the Mechanical Engineer for HVAC modifications in the existing plant. The project was delivered under a combination of design-build, fast-track and partnering.

We were able to utilize our experience in medium voltage design, system/facility master planning, power distribution, mission critical (data center), manufacturing systems and structured cabling design, along with our ability to work under unique contractual and project delivery methods to deliver a robust yet flexible and cost effective solution under tight time constraints.

  • Total project budgeted cost $60,000,000
  • Total project actual cost $33,072,965 – Phase I
  • Entrant’s portion of the budgeted cost: $4,920,922
  • Entrant’s portion of the actual cost: $5,415,200 – Includes structured cabling which was added to our scope

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Born from Johnson & Johnson in the 1950s, the name, Devro is an acronym of “Development and Research Organization,” where researchers developed a material suitable for the manufacture of sausage casings from collagen. With 2200 employees globally, Devro is headquartered in Scotland with sales offices in Germany, Russia, Hong Kong, Japan and New Zealand, and manufacturing and technical plants in Australia, the Czech Republic…and Sandy Run, SC.

A new 100,000-square foot industrial facility at the existing campus allows for twleve new production lines at full buildout with anticipated savings to the company of a reported $14 million annually as a result in the increase of production efficiency.

GWA Inc. coordinated closely with SCE&G for provision of a new substation to provide a distribution voltage of 13,800 volts with four 277/480-volt switchboards distributing power throughout the new facility. A “main-tie-main” configuration with double-ended transformers allows for redundancy.

In addition to the medium-voltage work, GWA, Inc. designed the IT, fire alarm, security and lighting systems along with on-site emergency generator backup, all-the-while working around the very confidential nature of the process and proprietary nature of the equipment.