Keller weathers storm to deliver in Vietnam

One of Vietnam’s largest industrial manufacturers, Hoa Phat Group, is investing more than US$2 billion in a major new iron and steel processing plant in the central coastal area of Dung Quat. With the majority of works expected to be finished in just two years, the company needed to get the project off to a flying start, which is why it appointed Keller to lay the foundations.

When it’s up and running at the end of 2019, the nearly 4km² Dung Quat mill will produce around four million tons of steel a year, chiefly for the construction industry.

“Typically a project of this size would take three or four years to be completed, but the owners are very ambitious and want to be in production within two years,” says Seah Yeow Teck, General Manager for New Territories at Keller ASEAN. “It’s a very fast-track project, so they only want quality, reliable contractors who can deliver on time, which is how Keller got involved.”

The scope of works included carrying out soil investigation, and designing and building foundations for the iron ore stockpile area, which covers around 200,000m². Large-scale testing was also required.

Drawing on global expertise

“This was the first time our Vietnam team had to deliver such a complex project, but one of the big advantages of Keller is that we’re able to draw on the expertise and experiences of our colleagues across the region,” explains Seah. “So we had experts from our teams in Singapore and Malaysia come over and provide invaluable support in terms of engineering, quality control, project management, site supervision and equipment.

“Through our local business development manager, Cao Ngoc Loi, we were able to engage early with the client, their consultants and equipment suppliers and use our knowhow from other projects across the region to model all aspects of the job. From this we created a robust and cost-efficient design that would meet the tight schedule.

“We considered numerous foundation techniques – such as piling, which has been used historically for stockpile foundations – but we eventually proposed vibro compaction for the upper sand layer and stone columns for the deeper clays. Together they provided the most economical solution in terms of cost and time, while still providing the quality needed.”

But no matter how detailed a design, the one thing you can’t control is the weather. Almost immediately the project was besieged by near-constant storms and flooding for three months, meaning only very minimal work could be carried out during this period.

Ahead of schedule

Thanks to a stringent monitoring and reporting system on site, meticulous contingency planning, and oversight from Keller ASEAN throughout delivery, the team led by Senior Project Manager Danny Toh and Project Manager Le Hong Quang was able to execute the works successfully. In fact, Keller delivered well ahead of schedule and impressed the client, who awarded extra work.

“The market in Vietnam is growing at the moment, with more money now being invested in large-scale industrial projects. And this project has definitely elevated the capability and reputation of our Keller Vietnam team; it’s demonstrated that we have the size, global expertise and innovative solutions to deliver complicated, high-profile, high-quality jobs on time.”