2021/22 EC Innovation Award winners

When we launched the Engineering Construction (EC) Innovation Award last year, the focus was to raise awareness and enable a platform to facilitate the best ideas and innovations from you all. 

Innovation is vital to our continued growth, new ideas lead to improvements in safety, increased productivity and better overall service offerings to our customers. Solving problems, developing and implementing solutions is part of our DNA at Monadelphous and it’s one of the reasons we’re relied on by our customers. 

That’s why we launched the inaugural EC Innovation Award last year! And after much deliberation, I’m very pleased to announce that we have two equal winners for the 2021/22 financial year, and two honorary mentions – competition was tough from the seven finalists, and we couldn’t go past these winners! 

Winner: Heavy Lift team at Woodside for the SPMT Davit Arm  

The SPMT Davit arm was designed to meet our customer, Woodside’s, very specific challenge and needs. Tasked with delivering a lifting solution to support the installation of 750mm gas pipeline sections through a narrow steep road with a 7-degree gradient, where cranes could not physically be setup without significant impact and risk. The solution developed by the Heavy Lift engineering team was the Davit Arm, utilising self-propelled modular trailers (SPMT) mounted with electric hoists.  

We choose the Davit Arm as a winner for its impressive engineering and technical solutions. While a bespoke solution to the project, the principles are transferable. On top of making the project technically possible, it also had flow on safety benefits by significantly reducing exposure to fatal risks.  

Watch a short video here on the award winning Davit Arm.  

Winner: Mining Area C (MAC) Surplus Water Project 3 (SWP3) project team for the Ergonomic Poly Weld Stands  

The Ergonomic Poly Weld Stands was another important winner, a frontline led initiative which was initially drawn up free hand in response to a manual handling issue associated with the volume of pipe welding on the surplus water project. After early rough ‘design’ the idea for the reconfigured ergonomic poly weld stand was progressed to detailed engineering, review and design input from the project leadership team – a true collaborative effort.  

The final product the team developed reduced manual handling by 50 per cent, improved productivity and reduced pinch point risks. Going forward the ergonomic poly weld stand concept is being implemented on other similar projects across the Group.  

Watch a short video here on the award winning Ergonomic Poly Weld Stands. 

Honorary mention: E&I team on the South Flank Inflow project for the HV Cable Installation Truck  

The HV cable installation truck significantly changed the way we installed long lengths of cable on the conveyor at South Flank and will change the way we do similar work on future projects. 

Honorary mention: Kemerton Lithium Plant project team for the Enclosed Downhill Incline Feeder Conveyor  

Another important frontline led initiative, the enclosed downhill incline feeder conveyor is a simple innovation that significantly improved both safety and productivity on the project, with the principle able to be applied to future works. 

Congratulations to the Heavy Lift team working on the Woodside project and the MAC SWP3 team for your commitment to turning problems into opportunities to innovate and improve our operations, while delivering on our promises to customers. 

Congratulations to our honorary mentions and thank you to everyone who saw opportunities and took initiative to put forward, trial, test and support ideas for improvement. 

And finally, thank you everyone for your hard work over the last 12 months. It has been a challenging time, but we recognise your considerable effort to deliver under these circumstances.  

I look forward to seeing what innovations you all have this coming year!