PROJECT CASE STUDY
Chemical Processing Plant
Major Shutdown & Capacity Upgrade
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Process industry shutdown · Full-time on-site delivery
Full project controls support for a major shutdown and capacity upgrade at a specialist chemical manufacturing facility, coordinating multiple contractors, integrating disconnected source schedules and maintaining live programme discipline under shutdown conditions.
CLIENT
Studley Engineering
PROJECT VALUE
£5M
LOCATION
Fleetwood, England
SECTOR
Chemical Processing
CONTRACT
JCT
THE CHALLENGE
Zero tolerance for drift: coordinating a live shutdown with contractors running to different schedules
Shutdown projects at chemical processing facilities carry a specific commercial pressure: every day offline is a day of lost production for the client. That means programme slippage is not an abstract risk, it has an immediate, quantifiable cost. The planning challenge on this project was compounded by the fact that contractors and subcontractors arrived with their own schedules in different formats (Excel, MS Project), with no single integrated view of the shutdown sequence.
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Establishing a coherent Primavera P6 master programme from those disconnected sources, and making the critical path and key commissioning deliverables visible to the engineering team before work began, was the prerequisite for everything else: progress tracking, change management, earned value and safe execution of subsequent trades.
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This project gave the team a maintained master schedule, live change visibility and consistent performance reporting throughout a pressurised shutdown delivery phase.
PROJECT DETAILS
Planning software
Source integration
Delivery model
Update cadence
Performance monitoring
Project type
Primavera P6
Excel & MS Project → P6
Full-time on-site
Weekly
Earned value analysis
Shutdown & upgrade
WHAT WE DELIVERED
Planning and controls support across the full shutdown
PROGRAMME INTEGRATION
P6 master schedule from multiple sources
Built a construction-oriented master programme in Primavera P6, integrating existing plans and third-party schedules from Excel and MS Project, giving the project team a single, coherent view of the shutdown sequence for the first time.
ON-SITE DELIVERY
Full-time dedicated on-site planner
A dedicated planner embedded on site throughout the shutdown, enabling real-time progress capture, direct engagement with the engineering division and immediate response to programme pressure as it developed.
COMMISSIONING CONTROL
Key deliverables tracker for commissioning
Integrated a key deliverables tracker into the master programme, making critical commissioning milestones visible and actively tracked, so the engineering team could plan subsequent activities with confidence.
CHANGE MANAGEMENT
Live change register alongside the programme
Maintained a detailed change register tracking the impact of evolving contractor designs and requirements on the programme, keeping the commercial position visible as the scope changed through delivery.
GOVERNANCE
Planning and programme outputs on this project were issued under NEC-accredited governance.
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PERFORMANCE MONITORING
Earned value analysis and dashboard
Applied earned value analysis to provide an objective basis for progress and budget reporting. Timeline visualisation and project metrics dashboard gave senior stakeholders a consistent, data-led view for decision-making at each project stage.
COMPENSATION EVENTS
CE claims management and verification
Supported management, coordination and verification of compensation event claims, maintaining traceable programme records and ensuring change impacts were correctly evidenced and assessed throughout delivery.
WHAT THIS DELIVERED
One coherent master schedule from disconnected contractor sources
PROGRAMME CONTROL
01
Multiple contractor schedules from different platforms unified into a single P6 master programme, giving the team a reliable view of the shutdown sequence from the outset.
Engineering team could manage construction activities safely and with confidence
CRITICAL PATH VISIBILITY
02
Critical deliverables and commissioning milestones made visible to the engineering division before work began, reducing ambiguity during a high-pressure shutdown environment.
Design and scope changes tracked live against the master programme
CHANGE VISIBILITY
03
The change register ran alongside the live schedule, so programme impacts of evolving contractor requirements were captured in real time, not reconstructed under time pressure.
Consistent, data-led reporting across all project stakeholders
STAKEHOLDER REPORTING
04
Weekly progress reporting, earned value analysis and a project metrics dashboard gave client, management and contractor teams a consistent, objective basis for decision-making throughout delivery.