Version 5 Launch - 29 June 2012 at Scottish Government, Edinburgh
On Friday 29 June, CEEQUAL launched its new Version 5 Methodology in Scotland for its second of four regional seminars. This completes CEEQUAL’s transition from an environmental assessment and awards scheme to a sustainability and awards scheme. The Seminar covered: the development and features of Version 5 (Ian Nicholson, CEEQUAL Technical Manager); the brand new ‘Project Strategy’ section in the Assessment Manual (Roger Venables, CEEQUAL Chief Executive); and two practitioners’ perspectives of CEEQUAL from Transport Scotland & Sir Robert McAlpine (Steven Brown, Transport Scotland
Roads and Infrastructure Manager | John Logan, Sir Robert McAlpine,
Sustainability Manager Scotland). |
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Stephen Thomson (top picture), opened the afternoon event with a warm welcome. After a summary of the afternoon's proceedings, there were some Award presentations to recipients of CEEQUAL for UK & Ireland Projects Awards (located in Scotland): Glencorse Water Treatment
Works: ‘Excellent (84.5%)’ Whole Project Award Scottish Water's new Glencorse Water Treatment Works (WTW) is delivering 21st century drinking water to around 450,000 people across Scotlands modern capital city. The works replaces two ageing facilities at Fairmilehead and Alnwickhill, which despite having served the city well for more than a century, now need replacing. Click here to view full case study. Presented by Roger Venables (centre).
White Cart Flood Prevention
Scheme: ‘Excellent (overall 76.5%)’ Whole Project
Award The White Cart Water Flood Prevention Scheme is designed to protect 1,750 properties and businesses in the south of Glasgow from the risk of flooding and over £100 million flood damages. The White Cart Water is a shallow, fast flowing river which is prone to flash-flooding and where water levels can rise by 6 meters after only 12 hours of rain. In 2002, the development of a flood alleviation scheme commenced based on a holistic catchment management principle looking for a solution that stretched beyond the city boundaries. Click here to view full case studies. Accepted by the Project Team and also presented by Roger Venables (right). |
Development and features of Version 5
Ian Nicholson began his presentation with an overview of what CEEQUAL can offer (including Term Contracts, Types of Awards available and the benefits of CEEQUAL). He then explained how Version 5 was different to Version 4, with primary changes being: improved coverage of questions, consolidation of the previous twelve sections into nine, better consistency between sections, raising the bar in areas of the Assessment and finally mentioning the brand-new ‘Project Strategy’ section (explained in full later by Roger Venables – see below).He then explained how the Online Assessment Tool has been upgraded, with brand-new features such as: ‘read-only’ user access, central document location, Assessment report and new discussion forum where Assessors can discuss issues experienced on projects. Ian concluded with an brief explanation that current Version 4 (or earlier) would have to go through a free Version 5 upgrade Assessor training course before undertaking a project under Version 5.
Brand-new ‘Project Strategy’ section in the Assessment Manual
Roger Venables opened with an explanation of why Project strategy was added to the CEEQUAL Methodology: “trigger project teams to look at their project in a wider scope... look at it in a sustainability point of view... and to challenge them to ask themselves on whether they are carrying out a ‘good’ project.”He went on to explain what Project Strategy covers (such as: wider economic benefits, social impact assessments, improving quality of life, EIA, resource strategy and life cycle assessments, and lastly pathway contribution). Roger explained the applicability of the new section and that it would be more applicable to Whole Project and Whole Project with Interim Awards. But the Section includes Construction Strategy, so the section is applicable to all partial awards too.
He concluded that “CEEQUAL’s aim with the inclusion of the new ‘Project Strategy’ section is to complete CEEQUAL’s transition from an environmental assessment and awards scheme to a sustainability assessment, rating and awards scheme.”
A Practitioner's View of CEEQUAL:Steven Brown - 'Transport Scotland’s experience of using CEEQUAL on Forth Replacement Crossing’' Steven started with a summary of the Forth Replacement Crossing project and his position of Project Manager was used to achieve a 'Very Good' CEEQUAL Award. He highlighted the objectives the project had and how by using CEEQUAL these objectives were met. The presentation was ended with an analysis of the benefits and challenges of CEEQUAL. Click here to download full transcript of Steven Brown's practitioner's view of CEEQUAL by Transport Scotland. |
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John Logan- 'The “Missing Link” and CEEQUAL – Using Version 4 on Scotland’s Newest Motorway' John opened with an introduction to the M74 project in Scotland and what this new transport link will mean for the area. After an outline of the project John went on to discuss what was good, what was challenging and what areas of improvement there should be within the CEEQUAL Scheme. Click here to download full transcript of John Logan's practitioner's view of CEEQUAL by Sir Robert McAlpine. |
 John Logan, Sir Robert McAlpine Sustainability Manager Scotland |
Q&A Discussion
Q: What is the difference between CEEQUAL for International Projects and CEEQUAL for UK & Ireland projects?
The ‘Projects’ Version of the CEEQUAL Methodology has one set of questions which are applicable to the two editions of the Projects manual (International and UK & Ireland). This gives all CEEQUAL Projects Assessments the same scope, coverage and question set.
What differs between the two editions of the manual is the detail of question guidance. The International manual has more general guidance which explains what the question entails and how to address the issues raised in the question. The UK & Ireland guidance is a lot more detailed in naming local regulations. We do recognise that the CEEQUAL Assessor does have to do more work on International Assessments in order to relate the question to local practice
Currently CEEQUAL has eight International projects that are either ongoing or completed. The first two projects were in Sweden and were triggered by Skanska (who are big users of the CEEQUAL UK & Ireland edition). There are various trials of the International edition being undertaken informally on projects. We hope as understanding and interest grows that these project teams will contact CEEQUAL for a project to go through the formal CEEQUAL process.
Q: Can you give me an example where something would apply to an International Assessment that wouldn’t apply to a UK & Ireland Assessment?
The guidance in the UK & Ireland manual refers to local regulations. The International manual is applicable to every country outside of the UK & Ireland. We therefore can’t have the same level of detail in the guidance of the International edition. An individual who undergoes a CEEQUAL Projects Training Courses is qualified to undertake both International and UK & Ireland Assessments. If they wish Assessors are able to use the UK & Ireland manual guidance as an indication of what evidence is needed in the country they are operating in. Over time, we are hoping that in a ‘CEEQUAL X’ edition of the manual there will be as much guidance about local regulations in ‘Country X’ as there is in the UK & Ireland edition of the manual.
Q: Are there any other similar schemes like CEEQUAL in the world?
There are two: one in the US (called Envision) and one in Australia. CEEQUAL has collaborated with both to launch their own products. They are very much at the start of their journey with the Australians having launched on the 29 February this year and the Americans in January. Both are in the early days of training their Assessors and Verifiers.
The Americans came to CEEQUAL to ask for their help to create their own version of an environmental rating tool. CEEQUAL did not act as a paid consultant but paid collaborator. This allowed for CEEQUAL to use any intellectual information from the experience to be fed into our methodology. The ‘Project Strategy’ section of the Version 5 manual stems from the work CEEQUAL did with the Americans.
All the tools are assessing the same scope but different involvement, depth ... For example the US tool is currently a Client and Design tool with the Construction side coming at a later date. They do not envision giving users the option for partial awards. What differs between these products and CEEQUAL is that CEEQUAL has been in operation for nine years. This experience allows for CEEQUAL to do things that they haven’t got to yet.
After the Q&A session, Stephen concluded the Seminar with a thank you to CEEQUAL and Ian and Roger returned the appreciation to the chairman and speakers. The Seminar ended with a round of applause and refreshments.
We thank everyone who attended
