Staying

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Out In Front
How Atkins’ migration from AVEVA PDMS
to AVEVA Everything3D has helped to
extend its competitive advantage

Western Australia is an expensive place to do business, so its

industries need to be particularly efficient at adding value if they
are to compete in world markets. Leading engineering design
consultancy, Atkins, has an important regional base in Perth and,
at the AVEVA World Summit 2014 in Berlin, Jim Wright, Design
Team Lead, Atkins, described how the company has increased its
competitive advantage, first by using AVEVA PDMS™, and then by
migrating to AVEVA Everything3D™ (AVEVA E3D™). We caught up
with him after his presentation to learn more.

AVEVA World Magazine Article Reprint

 Jim illustrated Atkins’ experience with some interesting project case
studies, citing the Abu Tubul gas processing plant in Oman as a turning
point in the software the company used. The whole job was supposed to
be executed in PDMS, but after the client fast-tracked the project, Atkins
decided to extract the information from the 3D model to generate the
drawings in AutoCAD, to produce the Bills of Materials and 2D drawings
more quickly than using PDMS Draft. However, there was a caveat.

‘The minute you break its link from a model, a drawing becomes useless,’
Jim explained. ‘The data can’t be updated. The problem with the previous
software was that as we updated the design drawings, it wasn’t being
reflected in the 3D model design. The model and the drawings continued to
diverge as successive modifications compounded previous inconsistencies.
It took a lot more effort to deliver a satisfactory result and we had to go
back to basics to create robust Quality Assurance and Quality Control
processes,’ continued Jim. ‘It meant rewriting many of our procedures
around PDMS.’

Apache Energy project

Learning from the experiences of the Abu Tubul project, Atkins decided to
put PDMS more at the centre of its engineering. The use of AutoCAD was
abandoned and drawings were generated directly from PDMS instead. At
around the same time, Atkins was awarded the Varanus Island Compression
Project (VICP) for Apache Energy. It was a complex greenfield project, but
with a lot of brownfield tie-ins and a demanding 14-week design schedule.

This highly collaborative, 8,500-man-hour project involved all engineering

disciplines, as well as the client, at each step of the design process. Modular
design enabled Atkins to run multiple teams in tandem to fast-track the
work. As a result, they were able to deliver the completed design in just 13
weeks.

The core communication tool was the 3D PDMS model. ‘Not only did the
level of detail and refinement of the model astonish the client,’ Jim said,
‘but our management were very supportive of the value PDMS gave to this
process. And because AVEVA had supported us closely throughout, it was
also recognised that they were a good partner to work with.’

AVEVA E3D shaves 40% off delivery times

The Abu Tubul project had shown the importance of generating all design
deliverables directly from the 3D model, so Jim’s interest was piqued by
a demonstration of AVEVA E3D’s Draw module, which enables the rapid
generation of 2D deliverables. ‘It looked easy to use,’ he said, ‘so we trialled
AVEVA E3D. We found that getting drawings out in this way would reduce
the delivery time of structural drawings by 40%. That’s a lot; 40% saves a
lot of money, especially if you’re looking at massive projects such as the
Apache Energy project.’

In addition to the challenge of creating fast and accurate deliverables,

the majority of Atkins’ projects are brownfield ones with difficult access
conditions and often inaccurate or incomplete as-built information
available. Traditional surveying techniques can be slow and costly. 3D laser
scanning offers a much quicker, cheaper and more efficient alternative;
large areas can be accurately scanned in a very short time.

Getting the survey data still remains a critical-path activity, but AVEVA
E3D’s point cloud integration can dramatically shorten it. ‘Instead of
waiting weeks for the information we need, we can get it in two days,’ Jim
enthused. ‘BubbleView™ enables you to rapidly check the 3D design model
against the scan to detect clashes. It’s very neat. It’s very quick.’

AVEVA World Magazine Article Reprint

 Jim Wright, Design Team Lead, Atkins, presenting at the AVEVA World Summit 2014 in Berlin.

As a result, Atkins had no hesitation in migrating to AVEVA E3D About Atkins

and updating its PDMS-based procedures to take advantage
of the new capabilities. ‘AVEVA E3D also reduces the extent
of site survey,’ Jim went on. ‘We only have to survey the tie-in
points and any identifiable pinch points. Some pinch points you
can’t identify until later, but even if we do miss one, AVEVA E3D
enables us to take quick and effective corrective action after the
fact. We not only gain speed and reduce risk, we also increase
design quality, which leads to further cost- and time-savings on
site.’
Atkins is one of the world’s leading design, engineering and
project management consultancies*, employing some 18,000
people across the UK, North America, Middle East, Asia Pacific
and Europe. Its breadth and depth of expertise, and its drive to
continually ask ‘why’, has enabled the company to plan, design
and deliver some of the world’s most complex and time-critical
projects.
To find out more, visit www.atkinsglobal.com/energy.

The future *15th-largest global design firm (Engineering News-Record 2014) and the 3rd-
largest multi-disciplinary consultancy in Europe (Svensk Teknik och Design 2013).
Atkins is in the process of launching its new global design
strategy, in which AVEVA technology will play a prominent role.
With AVEVA E3D and laser scan data, engineers anywhere in
Atkins can undertake extensive and accurate brownfield projects
without ever having to set foot in the actual facility. ‘But all of ‘AVEVA E3D has enabled
the checking and verification will still be handled through the
local Atkins team,’ Jim emphasised, ‘This approach is what
Atkins sees as its future; increased efficiency, delivering quality
Atkins to increase design
and enabling clients to tackle difficult projects with ease.’
flexibility and increase
Atkins is currently the only company in Western Australia to
use AVEVA E3D; Jim makes no secret of how glad he is of the accuracy. I’m honestly
competitive advantage. ‘AVEVA E3D has enabled Atkins to
increase design flexibility and increase accuracy,’ he concluded.
‘I’m honestly really impressed by it.’
really impressed by it...’
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