IMC-BAM-Atkins consortium providing safe water supply in Sierra Leone
Bunnik, the Netherlands, 17 October 2017 - In consortium with IMC Worldwide and Atkins, BAM has been awarded the design and construction contract to rehabilitate the water supply in Sierra Leone’s capital city, Freetown. The contract will develop the scheme through feasibility studies, engineering and detailed design and construction using NEC target cost contracts to demonstrate value and cost for each stage. BAM’s part of the project will amount to approximately €25 million.
The Engineering Management Services Project for the Rehabilitation of Freetown Water Supply is entirely funded by the UK government through the Department for International Development (DFID).
Water supply in Sierra Leone is characterised by limited access to safe drinking water. Despite efforts by the government and numerous non-governmental organisations, access has not much improved since the end of the Sierra Leone civil war in 2002. In Freetown, taps often run dry.
The project includes the rehabilitation of Guma Valley water treatment works, including rehabilitation work to the Guma Valley dam scour valves, the intake and gravity pipe and the rehabilitation of the main water transmission network in the west of Freetown.
The consortium will also target reducing the amount of leakage on the distribution network from 40 per cent to 25 per cent through a combination of improved leak detection and repair, and pressure/network management. Furthermore we will rehabilitate the secondary water distribution network, including 4 km of mains pipeline, 13 km of distribution network, 31 km of local supply network.
The consortium is led by IMC, an international development consultancy that partners with local communities, governments, international development agencies, NGOs, and the private sector to address some of the world’s primary development challenges. IMC has successfully delivered numerous projects for DFID as well as led countless infrastructure projects throughout the world.
WS Atkins International Ltd is one of the largest engineering consultancies in the UK, with an institutional knowledge of Freetown’s water supply. It was Atkins who led the 2008-2009 DFID-funded Freetown Water Supply and Sanitation Strategic Framework Study and Design Project that developed a lot of the original scope. In 2016 IMC Worldwide and Atkins undertook DFID-PEAKS project on the preparatory design, specification and contract packaging for rehabilitation works for Freetown’s Water Supply system.
BAM is represented in the consortium by civil engineering specialist BAM Nuttall and BAM International, the operating company of Royal BAM Group active outside Europe.
Further information:
- analysts: Joost van Galen, +31 (0)30 659 87 07.
- press: Arno Pronk, +31 (0)30 659 86 23;