Black & Veatch Forms Tunneling Department To Meet Special Water Infrastructure Needs
Vice President David Egger Named to Head New Department
Kansas City, MO - Black & Veatch recently announced the formation of a tunneling department within its Water Americas division to formalize an alignment of Black & Veatch talents with utility clients' underground needs. The organizational change consolidates the company's tunneling and geoengineering expertise in one business unit, which will be responsible for stand-alone, heavy civil-engineering projects, particularly tunnels and dams.
David Egger, a Black & Veatch vice president, will lead a team of geologists, geotechnical engineers, mining engineers and civil engineers. Egger has managed numerous water and wastewater tunneling projects throughout the United States in his 21-year career with Black & Veatch.
Driven by continued population growth in urban areas, new water quality regulations and aging infrastructure, the demand for tunneling design and construction assistance by water and wastewater utilities and cities has significantly increased over the past decade.
"We are seeing rapid growth in the need for tunneled conveyance and storage solutions in our market," said Dan McCarthy, president of Black & Veatch Water Americas. "Underground hydraulic conveyance facilities are reliable and secure, require reduced expenditures on operations and maintenance over their lifespan, and enable our clients to meet their customers' needs without constructing aboveground structures or disrupting the surface environment where we live and work."
Many cities and utilities view tunneling as a solution to regulatory requirements in the combined sewer overflow (CSO) and sanitary sewer overflow (SSO) arenas. Aging and undersized sewer systems can overflow during storm events, resulting in detrimental runoff to local waterways. Tunneling can provide diversion, transportation and storage during such events and bring utilities into regulatory compliance.
Tunneling structures also provide for uninterrupted fresh water delivery for forward-thinking communities. In addition, tunneling offers an attractive alternative to aboveground construction because it minimizes impacts to neighborhoods, businesses, wildlife and downstream recreational uses.
"Our clients have always appreciated our specialized, integrated geotechnical expertise," said Egger. "We've made it even easier to tap into that expertise. And no other global company has the deeply ingrained tunneling experience that Black & Veatch brings to the water and environmental markets."
Black & Veatch has more than 30 years of tunnel project experience, including design and construction of the award-winning Trans-Missouri River Tunnel in Kansas City, Mo., the Denny Way CSO Tunnel in Seattle, Wash. and the River Mountains Tunnel in Las Vegas, Nev. Current tunneling activities include the company's recent selection for a major tunnel design project near Washington, D.C., design and construction of a wastewater collection tunnel replacement in Charleston, S.C. and the "hole through" of a 20-foot-diameter, 7-mile-long water tunnel 200 feet below Milwaukee, Wis.
About Black & Veatch
Black & Veatch Corporation is a leading global engineering, consulting and construction company specializing in infrastructure development in the fields of energy, water and information. Founded in 1915, Black & Veatch serves its clients with conceptual and preliminary engineering services, engineering design, procurement, construction, financial management, asset management, information technology, environmental, security design and consulting, and management consulting services. Headquartered in Overland Park, Kan., the employee-owned company has more than 90 offices worldwide. Black & Veatch is ranked on the Forbes "500 Largest Private Companies in the U.S." listing for 2003. The company's Web site address is www.bv.com.
Source: Black & Veatch Corporation