2024 Shallow Utility Civil Construction Demand Peak Expected

BILD Calgary Region Bulletin 2024 – 39

The following bulletin was provided by Shallow Utilities Consortium. Please view the bulletin in PDF form here or below:

Further to the Bulletin issued on March 22, 2024 “Shallow Utility Temporary Civil Construction Capacity Adjustment” The Shallow Utilities Consortium (Consortium), with the help of Industry, have limited the release of Civil construction crews back to the market, allowing 13 construction crews to keep working during that slow period. Now let’s turn our attention to the peak demand period laying ahead for this year.

The graph below is a representation of what can be expected in terms of peak demand for Q3 and Q4 2024, as it relates to shallow utilities installation site readiness from the Calgary Developers.

The July to September period will see approximately 47 projects turn site ready, with an additional 31 projects expected to be site ready in Q4. This volume peak will place tremendous strain on the available civil construction and trades resources during this period, continuing into Q1 of 2025.

What is being done to address the civil construction resource supply?

The Consortium currently contracts with 11 construction firms, providing a total of 17 construction crews. There is an ability to add 3 more construction crews from the existing contractor pool to meet the expected demand. This will bring the contractor crew count from existing contractors to a total of 20.A further 5 construction firms have responded to the open RFP and the Consortium is in the process of pre-qualifying and contracting with them to provide up to 5 additional civil construction crews.

These efforts have the potential to yield up to 25 construction crews to perform shallow utility construction.

Developer and Consultant Call to Action:

1. Developers and their consultants are urged to:
   Contact their ENMAX project manager:
   • To provide detailed schedule information around the forecasted and actual site readiness dates for all projects. PLEASE NOTE: Site readiness criteria will be strictly enforced, to avoid deeps, surface and shallow contractors working concurrently on the same site.
   • To provide any details on their scheduled deep underground installation plans and to identify any projects that are currently ready and waiting on shallow utility installation.
   • To provide a list of projects that will be targeted for the Developer Construct delivery model, planning to come into effect in Q4 of this year.
2.  Encourage any interested shallow utility contractors to contact Jesse Retzlaff jretzlaff@enmax.com (403) 689-0106 and/or Joe Beetge 4PConsortium@enmax.com (403) 561-6515 to start the pre-qualifying process for contractors interested in pursuing the Developer Construct model.

PLEASE NOTE: Every effort is made to match the developer demand with available shallow utility civil construction and trades resources, however, due to the magnitude of the spike in demand, a construction queue of 1-3 months is expected in Q4 of this year. Please contact your ENMAX Project Manager to obtain an update on the current construction timelines for your specific project portfolio.

If more context around this situation is required, please reach out to me directly. My contact details can be found below.

Joe Beetge
Executive Director
Shallow Utilities Consortium
403 561 6515
4PConsortium@enmax.com