Eskom awards contract for extension of power station infrastructure

Concor Infrastructure’s order pipeline has received a further boost with the awarding of a contract to extend the ash disposal facility (ADF) at Eskom’s Kendal power station near Ogies in Mpumalanga.

According to Concor Infrastructure managing director, Eric Wisse, the work focuses on the construction of a continuous lined ash dump and its associated infrastructure. The extended facility will be capable of accommodating the ash generated by Kendal until the year 2032.

The 24-month project will commence on 1 July and also includes the construction of two dams, a stream diversion and site services, as well as the lowering of the wall of an existing Farm Dam. The Kendal award comes just months after the company signed another Eskom contract in January– for the ADF at Majuba power station near Amersfoort.

“News of the Kendal ADF award has certainly been most welcome given the uncertainty and disruption related to the Covid-19 pandemic in recent weeks,” says Wisse. “It is also encouraging that contracts of this type and scale are coming available for our civil engineering and construction sector, which has faced difficult trading conditions for many years.”

The project will require about 109 hectares to be cleared and grubbed,  almost 1,5 million cubic metres of excavation and approximately 1million cubic metres of fill / layerworks to be processed. To ensure adequate environmental protection, over 750,000 square metres of 1,5 mm HDPE liner will be used, with the same amount of 1,000 gram-per-square-metre geotextile. Concrete works will require 39,000 cubic metres of concrete, and there will be 4,400 metres of pipeline laid.

Wisse highlights that the Kendal contract will be conducted in a fully-integrated joint venture with partner company Lubocon Civils. Having previously worked as a subcontractor to Concor Infrastructure, Lubocon Civils has proven the quality and reliability of its work. The JV is an indication of Concor Infrastructure’s commitment to empowering younger firms to grow their contribution in the sector, he says.

“Among the attributes that Lubocon Civils brings is its relationships with QSE and EME contractors, where they can assist the JV to effectively award the relevant portions of work to local firms, to manage subcontractors and to develop small enterprises,” says Wisse.

He notes that the two ADF projects won by Concor Infrastructure, in their JV partnership with Lubocon Civils, is an indication of the company’s strong capacity and broad range of expertise in the civil engineering and construction space.