Macway Uhl helped a major company assess the political, environmental, and regulatory risks involved in a re-gasification facility to be sited in a congested area.

Challenge

A U.S. based oil company along with its international partners were considering the development of a re-gasification terminal at a site with significant environmental and regulatory challenges.  They needed to gain alignment with their partners on how best to tackle a variety of project challenges, on how to prioritize regulatory approval efforts, and on expectations for achieving these goals.

Solution

Macway Uhl conducted a schedule risk analysis with the major partners.  Based on the deterministic schedule, regulatory and other risks were assessed, including the underlying drivers of each risk and their impacts on key milestones.

Insights were revealed about the likelihood of each activity delaying the project and risk management plans were developed.  These included contracting philosophies, internal approval processes, and project execution strategies to both prevent and mitigate adverse outcomes.

Results

• The analysis revealed that state regulatory approvals actually were quite unlikely to drive the critical path of the project; instead, key civil design work needed additional focus as the primary schedule driver
• By illustrating the importance of pre-approval delays (which the analysis indicated represented 40+% of the schedule risk), the partners re-focused their efforts from construction risk assessment towards their own internal alignment and approval processes