Innovation

At Fletcher Construction we're right at the cutting edge of innovation. Our Engineering Services team's got digital skills that give our teams - and our clients - a mind-blowing amount of information about projects of all sizes. Take a look at this video to see what they're capable of.

Our digital engineering capabilities offer a lot of benefits to our customers. One of them is cost savings.

We are currently delivering a new wastewater treatment plant at Snells Beach for Watercare, who says our suite of digital tools has helped to streamline the project, and therefore save a substantial amount of money.

Higgins is exploring the wider use of biogenic (plant-based) bitumen for building asphalt and chip seal pavements.

Adding plant-based biogenic components to binders used in bitumen can help decarbonize road construction by capturing an increasing amount of carbon in road surfaces or other asphalt-based products as they are recycled and reused over time.

Higgins is hopeful of a successful development in this area, which will extend our contribution towards the Fletcher Construction roadmap for a 30% reduction in carbon emissions and a sustainable future "for generations to come".

The Ara Tūhono - Puhoi to Warkworth motorway is not just a fantastic piece of roading – it’s been a perfect case study of how we’re using cutting-edge technology at Fletcher Construction. When work started on the project six years ago for our clients NX2 and Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency, we managed to get our hands on the then-relatively new software Propellor.

This allows our drone pilots to take measurements from the sky, then use them to reliably map, measure, and report on site progress. It means they’re able to produce a virtual 3D replica of the site, week to week.

The Ara Tūhono - Puhoi to Warkworth motorway winds through some pretty rocky landscape. That’s meant in some areas, the easiest way to build the new road was to use explosives.

The project was built by Fletcher Construction Major Projects and Acciona along with a team of subcontractors for clients NX2 and Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency. As a team, we worked with RedBull Powder Company along with Acciona’s International Blasting Specialists to clear a path for the motorway. We filmed the blasting as it happened, which has made for some pretty spectacular footage to look back on!

We’re using a remote control roller in our work to repair one of the major slips in Coromandel (McBeth-Opoutere). We’ve built a retaining wall to support the road above, backfilled it, and the roller has just finished levelling.

The remote control roller is used in areas where we need to flatten ground near any steep drop-offs. This means if something did go wrong and the roller tipped off the edge, none of our people would be hurt in the process.

Brian Perry Civil's 4D Synchro presentations are delivering significant advantages in the Tender and Early Contractor Involvement (ECI) stages of challenging infrastructure projects. Digital Engineer Jovan Krstic says hazards can be better foreseen and safety risks reduced.

“The increased project visualisation helps discussion and collaboration on complex projects. It really improves project planning and benefits everyone involved.”

Our digital engineers use Bentley Systems Synchro 4D software to prepare animations.

“4D sequencing of works improves project planning and coordination of ongoing operations,” Jovan says. “It identifies lead times to optimise construction duration, improves constructability, and greatly improves monitoring of actual progress against planned progress, which reduces claims by more quickly identifying and resolving issues.”

A ‘bubble curtain’ is being used by Brian Perry Civil to protect marine life around the Seaview Energy Resilience Project being delivered for CentrePort Ltd.

With environmental protection always a priority for BPC’s teams, the bubble curtain is a way of using technology to maximise protection for marine life in Wellington Harbour.

The bubbles act as an acoustic screen, reducing the transmission of underwater noise generated by the piling works and protecting whales and dolphins from distress and hearing damage. On-site monitoring has shown that the use of the bubble curtain reduces the area of influence from piling noise from over 2km down to less than 10m.

An environmentally-friendly cardboard guide wall pilot has proved successful at BPC’s Taranaki Street Pump Station project in central Wellington.

Project Manager Jasper Snyder says the team was required to shoot piles to a depth of 17m below ground, so a guide wall was needed to provide the interlocked structure.

Polystyrene former blocks would normally be used, but Engineering Services Manager Brendan Attewell came up with the more sustainable alternative of using huge cardboard tubes, traditionally only used for casting above-ground piles.

Jasper thinks this is the first time the Sonoco tubes have been used for guide walls. “They were more challenging to manage than polystyrene, but well worth using,” he says. “The result was excellent, and they’re an environmentally-friendly and cost-effective option. I can see us using this method on other projects.”

We are embedding special sensors as we pour concrete at Auckland Airport – saving time and giving certainty about the quality of the product. Check out the video for more detail on yet another awesome approach from our Engineering and Innovation team.

We can do some amazing things with our new digital engineering tools – but how can we measure their value?

We’ve made a huge investment into digital engineering at Fletcher Construction, and it’s really starting to pay off for our people and our customers. But it’s not always easy to communicate the value of our digital tools. To help get to the bottom of this, we recently hosted a discussion on digital engineering at our Penrose HQ. Beca’s Glenn Jowett, Auckland Airport’s Karl Fitzpatrick and our very own Matt Findlay talked about how we can measure the value of digital engineering from a client, consultant and contractor perspective. The discussion was held in conjunction with our friends at AUT, and facilitated by the Head of Huri Te Ao/The School of Future Environments, Charles Walker.  

The panel shared some great insights, and there were some excellent questions from the audience too.