Pineham Distribution Centre

Throughout the contract on the 190,000m2 carbon neutral, cost-efficient facility that services the Midlands and South-East England we faced numerous challenges, requiring our in-house design team to work with the operations team to provide appropriate solutions. For example, the as-built drawings had provided erroneous information, requiring us to develop a solution to remodel all levels and kerb lines. Consequently, the concrete slabs over the services remained in-situ, mitigating the need for costly service diversions.

Throughout the works, the depot remained a live environment and at tender stage the Sainsbury’s project team and stakeholders challenged us to develop a proposal to guarantee the safety of its 150 staff and keep the depot running at full capacity, minimising any down time and loss of stock. The project team’s solution was to install 8m high temporary insulated panels in front of each proposed dock. This segregated the works from Sainsbury’s operations by enabling us to open up the building without negatively impacting the temperature of the chilled floor space and causing loss to fresh produce. This successful approach led to a commendation from Sainsbury's for preventing negative impact on daily operations.

Once completed, we recycled and reused the panels for the side reveals to the new pod docks in order to reduce the waste from the 8m high temporary wall system. This project was extremely successful from a health and safety point of view and met the high expectations of the client on a site with high amounts of ammonia, (ammonia is a liquid used in chiller systems but when it reacts with air it forms a gas that can remove oxygen).

Despite the occurrence of two leakages (caused by events outside of our remit), we maintained the health and safety of all operatives and did not let the incidents slow down work or impinge on an otherwise impeccable health and safety record.