Guest-of-Honour Professor Cheong Hee Kiat, President, Singapore University of Social Sciences (4th from left), presented the award to representatives from Surbana Jurong, DIAP-SHAP joint venture, and JTC.
The Jurong Island Westward Extension (JIWE) reclamation project has been named Project of the Year (POY) 2018-19 by SPMI, the Project Management Institute Singapore Chapter.
The award falls under the Engineering and Construction category for project values of more than S$20 million. Projects are evaluated based on project management practices, innovation, value creation, complexity and impact.
JIWE (before):
JIWE (after):
The JIWE project was recognised for its excellent project execution, through the collaborative efforts of Surbana Jurong, its client, Jurong Town Corporation (JTC), and contractor, Dredging International Asia Pacific and Starhigh Asia Pacific (DIAP-SHAP) Joint Venture.
The project involved the reclamation of 172ha of new land at Jurong Island for industrial use. Surbana Jurong was the appointed consultant providing front-end engineering design, project management, contract administration and site supervision.
Volunteers from Surbana Jurong’s Coastal Engineering unit and their families with their “haul” for the day – bags of rubbish littering Singapore’s protected coastline.
Surbana Jurong’s Coastal Engineering business unit works hard every day to promote sustainable coastal developments. So when the time came to pick a worthwhile team activity, it seemed fit that they contributed to a cleaner coastline too.
One Saturday morning in March, the Coastal Engineering’s team members and their families gathered for a boatride to Pulau Ubin, an island off the northeast coast of Singapore, before heading off to Chek Jawa, an intertidal flat with a rich ecosystem that is located at its remote eastern tip. Unfortunately, the beautiful scenery was marred by the litter around them.
The group made up of over 30 volunteers started removing the waste from the beach and surrounding mangrove, counting plastic bags, bottles, styrofoam, PVC tubes and medical waste among the debris. It was back-breaking work but they filled many rubbish bags in the end.
On the upside, it was a valuable teaching moment for the children of the volunteers, who learned how the oceans are being increasingly choked by plastic waste – which threatens the existence of marine life such as sea turtles, fish, seabirds and coral; they may ingest the plastics or be injured by discarded fishing lines and flotsam.
Another high point was how everyone could enjoy the songs of robins and hornbills and the lapping of waves in the distance while they worked. The event not only allowed the Coastal Engineering team to help the environment but to see a greater purpose to their work at Surbana Jurong.
This event also reminded our Coastal Engineering team of the importance of their work; to ensure that projects under their supervision carries out all mitigation measures to protect the environment.
3D artist impression on Polder Development at Pulau Tekong
Surbana Jurong has broken new ground in Singapore’s land reclamation efforts. As the appointed consultants for a Housing Development Board (HDB) project to reclaim land around the northwestern tip of Pulau Tekong (located off Singapore’s northeastern coast), SJ played an important role in pioneering the development of a unique method which will significantly reduce Singapore’s reliance on sand and help save on upfront construction costs.
Called the polder development method, the new method will be adopted in Singapore for the first time and upon completion will add 810 hectares of land to Pulau Tekong, increasing Singapore’s land size by approximately one per cent.
SJ’s infrastructure and Urban Development teams have provided HDB with the overall planning and detailed engineering design for the development of the polder including that of its innovative water management system, dikes, pumping stations, drainage structures, electrical and mechanical systems.
A polder is a low-lying tract of land that has been reclaimed from the sea. A wall or dike is constructed to prevent seawater from entering the polder, while water levels within the polder are controlled by a network of drains and pumps.
Polders are historically used by the Dutch, and the Netherlands has the highest standards for dike safety in the world. To that end, SJ drew on the Netherlands’ experience by partnering Royal Haskoning DHV to gain advance knowledge of the reclamation method.
We have also prepared the tender specifications and drawings for the construction stage, and assisted with obtaining the statutory approvals for the development from various government agencies. SJ will provide the design supervision when construction works, set for end 2017, begin.
Click here to view the video on the new reclamation method.
