INDUSTRIAL EXPANSION

 

GARYVILLE, LOUISIANA

The Marathon Petroleum Company recently completed its estimated $3.2 billion GME project in Garyville, Louisiana. The expansion project increased Garyville’s refining capacity from 245,000 bpd to 425,000 bpd.

The 400-acre GME shares many components of the existing 900-acre refinery.  After completing the preliminary geotechnical investigation for the GME project, Eustis Engineering Services, L.L.C. performed a series of additional investigations as well as geotechnical engineering services for various phases.  They included investigations for new and existing docks, storage tanks, a new causeway, heavy haul roads, pipe rack expansions, building additions, and laydown areas.

In addition to the geotechnical services, Eustis Engineering provided construction quality control and materials testing services.  These services included concrete, steel, asphalt, and soil fill testing.  In addition, Eustis Engineering logged driven pile installations and performed dynamic pile testing using a PDA.  At one point in time, Eustis Engineering worked with 11 different contractors/construction companies while providing as many as 13 technicians and full-time administrative support on site.

By the end of July 2009, Eustis Engineering’s QA/QC technicians had worked more than 33,600 man-hours on this plant expansion. Our technicians performed more than 9,500 in-place soil density tests (issuing more than 2,900 reports) and inspected more than 108,000 cubic yards of concrete (issuing nearly 2,500 reports). Concrete inspection was provided for pile caps, piers, pedestals, columns, various building foundations/slabs, area paving, duct banks, ringwalls, and equipment pads. Eustis Engineering provided numerous design and construction phase services for this plant expansion and was able to meet the geotechnical design challenges as well as demanding schedule and personnel requirements.

Professional engineering services included the development of soil parameters site-wide by project feature from soil exploration data and geologic knowledge of the area. Eustis Engineering performed the geotechnical engineering for the GIWW Bypass Gate, developed estimates of pile capacity, and determined pile drivability for the entire project. As Designer of Record, Eustis Engineering reviewed all geotechnical engineering submittals and guided all other consultants through the design procedures mandated by the Corps of Engineers. Being a Design-Build project, the Geotechnical Designer of Record has been instrumental in working with Shaw E & I to explore avenues for project cost savings while maintaining an aggressive schedule for completion.