Blunt Construction completes the construction of a Veolia regional office in just seven months
(17/08/2009)

Blunt Construction, based near Winchester, has completed the construction of a major regional office in record time. Blunt Construction won the Design and Build contract for a new cost-efficient modular office building for the Veolia Group, based in Otterbourne, Hampshire.

The new building, covering 980m2, was conceived as one of the four new regional offices for Veolia – a supplier of integrated waste management services.

Replacing an assortment of time-expired portable buildings, the contract, worth £1.4m, was completed in just seven months. This included adaptations and additions to the original plans within the same time frame, and even achieved a two week saving on the initial contract period. As part of the contract, an extension to an existing building and associated external building and ground works were also undertaken.

A modular construction approach was conceived to reduce capital spend and construction time, as operations had to be relocated off site during this period. This included advanced offsite manufacturing techniques.

Mark Taylor, Operations Director for Veolia Environmental Services (Hampshire) Ltd, says: “Blunt Construction provided high quality performance at a competitive cost to ensure we achieved our programme. Their honesty, openness and good communication made for an excellent working relationship, and we’ve had nothing but positive reactions to the new building.”

“The standard of the modular building construction was important as it affects the welfare and wellbeing of staff. The aesthetics of the building design both externally and internally were therefore very important to us to make sure it felt like a conventional building. We also worked with Blunt Construction to ensure consideration was paid to the environmental impact of the building work, to reduce our carbon footprint long term.”