Dredging Roundup / NORTH AMERICA November-December
GLDD GETS $103 M CLEANUP CONTRACT $28 M BARRIER AWARD
Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Corporation was awarded a $103 million contract for the construction of the National Resources Damage Assessment (NRDA) Caillou Lake Headlands (TE-100) project from the State of Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority (CPRA).
GLDD is also the apparent successful bidder for the $28 million Chenier Ronquille Barrier Island Restoration Project.
The Caillou Lake project includes restoring the entire shoreline of the barrier island commonly known as Whiskey Island in Terrebonne Parish. The work includes beach and dune restoration using material dredged from the offshore shoal borrow source as well as restoring the marsh platform along the western half of the island.
Using a hydraulic cutter suction dredge and booster stations GLDD will dredge about 10 million cubic yards of seabed sand and pump it 14 miles through a submerged slurry pipeline to create more than 900 acres of barrier island and marsh habitat. Work on this project is expected to begin in 2016 and will be completed in 2017.
The Chenier Ronquille project is contracted by the U.S. Department of Commerce National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and requires restoration of the beach/dune and back barrier marsh platform of this barrier island in Plaquemines Parish Louisiana. The project which has yet to be formally awarded will use approximately 2.7 million cubic yards of material dredged from an offshore Gulf of Mexico borrow source to restore nearly 390 acres of the barrier island and habitat. Work on this project is expected to be performed in 2016.
These projects are the second and third of four components in the Louisiana Outer Coast Restoration being funded with Deepwater Horizon NRDA Early Restoration funds. The $76 million Shell Island West NRDA was the first component project to be contracted and it was awarded to Great Lakes in July 2015 with work expected to commence later this year.
The fourth component project will be for restoration of North Breton Island in the Breton National Wildlife Refuge.
GLDD president of dredging operations David Simonelli said “We look forward to working with CPRA as it executes its mission of restoring land lost and improving flood protection systems in order to protect Louisiana’s coast and its many assets. Our hydraulic dredges and booster stations are well-suited to build these important barrier islands. These projects will occupy previously under-utilized cutter suction dredges.”
WEEKS GIVEN $6.5 MILLION BRAZOS ISLAND HARBOR CONTRACT
Weeks Marine Inc. was awarded a contract worth $6521000 from the Galveston Engineer District for maintenance dredging of the Brazos Island Harbor Jetty and entrance channels.
Weeks will be required to remove about 651000 cubic yards of materials using pipeline dredges to clear the navigation channels. All materials will be used to nourish South Padre Island beaches. Work was to begin in October and was expected to be completed by February 2016.
The Brazos Island channel is 42 feet deep about 300 feet wide and 23 miles long extending from the Gulf of Mexico to the Port of Brownsville and Port Isabel.
J.F. BRENNAN GETS $8.7 MILLION CORPS CONTRACT
The Corps of Engineers has awarded an $8.7 million contract to J.F. Brennan Company Inc. of La Crosse Wisconsin to unload dredged material in Wabasha.
Brennan is expected to begin moving the dredged material during summer 2016.
Almost 800000 cubic yards of dredged material will be moved from Crats Island near Wabasha via a pipeline route that is about five miles long. The material will be placed at the Corps’ Wabasha gravel pit located near the intersection of U.S. Hwy. 61 and Bruegger Valley Road.
The Corps is removing the material from the island to ensure that there is enough room for the future placement of dredged material from the Mississippi River.
NEW JERSEY LIFTS WINTER DREDGING BAN
The New Jersey state legislature lifted a longtime ban on winter dredging that was designed to protect the winter flounder.
The first public announcement of the rescinding was made on the night of October 18 at the Stone Harbor Golf Club at a dredging forum sponsored by the Cape May County Chamber of Commerce.
The move is expected to affect dozens of dredging and beach-replenishment projects. The ban pushed dredging to the warmer months during boating season which was bad for business and it also increased costs by cutting five months off the year for such work.
The ending of the ban is expected to boost marine businesses and to bring cost savings for taxpayers on public dredging projects. The ban on dredging from January through May is being lifted from Absecon Inlet south to the Delaware Bay. It will remain in effect in Ocean County.
U.S. Rep. Frank LoBiondo R-2nd the keynote speaker at the forum titled “Our Economy is Aground” welcomed the announcement according to The Press of Atlantic City. He said the announcement would affect 30 dredging projects.
GLDD GETS CONTRACT FOR CORPUS LNG WORK
Great Lakes Dredge & Dock announced on September 29 the award of a contract with Corpus Christi Liquefaction LLC (CCL) a subsidiary of Cheniere Energy Inc. The amount was undisclosed.
CCL is developing a liquefied natural gas (LNG) export terminal at a site located on the north shore of Corpus Christi Bay in San Patricio and Nueces Counties Texas.
Great Lakes’ portion of the LNG project involves the dredging and slope protection of two LNG carrier ship berths dredging of a material offloading and tug mooring basin and expansion of an existing La Quinta Channel turning basin.
The total quantity to be dredged is approximately 4.3 million cubic yards and the materials will be placed into an adjacent upland beneficial use site. Great Lakes expects to commence this work in the fourth quarter of 2015.
BARNSTABLE APPROVES DREDGE FUNDS
Recent storms have so shoaled Barnstable Harbor on Cape Cod Massachusetts that town officials believed one more winter could in block the channel to large vessels entirely.
In the second week of October the Barnstable Town Council approved $490000 for Phase One of a plan to dredge the harbor’s outer channel of the harbor. That project would begin this fall using the county dredge and the 8000 cubic yards of sand dredged would be deposited on Sandy Neck.
Phase two Barnstable Department of Public Works Director Daniel Santos told local media would take place next fall.
The project is being paid for by bonding and will be combined with other bonding authorizations for the year as part of the town’s 2016 Capital Improvement Program Santos said.
NJ DOT AWARDS SHARK RIVER CONTRACT
The New Jersey Department of Transportation announced at the end of September the award of a $78.6 million contract to Mobile Dredging and Pumping Co. of Chester Pennsylvania to dredge the navigation channel in the Shark River.
The company will remove about 102000 cubic yards of sediment comprised of sand and silt to “restore the state channels to allow safe passage for recreational and commercial traffic” according to a state press release.
Two dewatering sites will be used: part of the Belmar Marina parking lot in Belmar Borough and Seaview Island in Neptune Township. The dewatered material will be trucked to the Monmouth County Reclamation Center for beneficial use.
The state said the project should be completed by the winter of 2016.
