Sending gigantic steel structures on their travels is all in a day’s work for the experts at Linde, who can draw on decades of experience to plan everything down to the last detail. Nevertheless, each project, shipment, cargo and itinerary poses its own unique challenges and complexities. Hardly anyone would be better placed to know this than Dr Harald Schubert, Senior Project Director at Linde Engineering, who is working with his global team to manage a megaproject: the Amur Gas Chemical Complex (GCC). This is set to house the world’s largest steam cracker for ethane and LPG feedstocks.

Yet the sheer scale of the quench tower was not the only hurdle to be overcome. The shipping route, including a 2,200 kilometer stretch along Siberian rivers, was a test in itself. “The rivers on this route are frozen over from mid-October to early May, and melting ice then clogs the mouth of the Amur River until early June, blocking passage. So our window of opportunity was only about 130 days,” outlines Matthias Pohlmann, Logistics Manager for the Linde project. “What’s more, we would only have a guaranteed water depth of 1.1 meters for the last 212 kilometers.” The shipment would also need to pass under two bridges with a clearance of 11 to 16 meters, depending on the water level. To enable transport of the quench tower under these conditions, Linde built a special barge, which was launched in Shanghai in May. The column was then loaded onto the barge in Korea, to embark on its voyage to Russia. Towards the end of May, the convoy reached the Russian east coast and, in early June, the port of De Kastri for its final leg upstream towards Svobodny and the Amur GCC. On July 7, the plant component finally arrived at its destination.

To achieve this, Leimer and his team are onboarded right at the start of a new project, at the concept phase. This involves defining the path of construction and developing the concept schedule, which maps core interdependencies and milestones to ensure smooth collaboration between engineering, procurement, and assembly. The Linde experts also integrate delivery times for specific materials at this point, so the individual work packages can be efficiently processed, one after the other. “You can see why it’s so important to define and align work packages early on in AWP. This enables us to plan engineering documents at an early stage, place orders accordingly, closely coordinate the supply chain and organize site staff in good time. That then avoids idle time or downtime later on – cutting unnecessary costs,” explains Leimer. In the case of the quench tower specifically, continues Schubert, this meant: “Getting the plant component to the site at a very specific time. Late delivery would disrupt the entire construction schedule and jeopardize timely commencement of operations, but too early could be a problem too – say if the foundations were not yet in place or cranes not available to erect the tower. There’s no space for temporary storage, so that then has to be rented at high cost, or you have equipment blocking the construction site.” To avoid this kind of scenario, all work packages for engineering and procurement are delivered in the order work is carried out on the ground. This ultimately ensures that idle time, productivity losses and delays for construction crews caused by late deliveries are no longer an issue.