The speed and scope of urbanisation in Asia Pacific is an unprecedented masterpiece of human engineering not set to slow down anytime soon. Between 1980 and 2010, the region’s cities grew by around one billion people and United Nations projections show they will add another one billion by 2040. By 2050, the number of people living in cities in China and India alone will grow by 696 million (India...
Challenges facing risk managers on large projects
As an extraordinary number of complex projects fail to come in on time and budget, it seems that owners are losing faith in risk management. The following five phenomena help to explain what’s going wrong Over the past two decades, the global project industry has experienced noticeable improvements in defining and standardising both project control and risk management better practice. Despite...
One Belt One Road initiative
China’s One Belt One Road initiative means billions of dollars’ worth of infrastructure projects are up for grabs – but firms with flawed risk management could come unstuck. With the Chinese economy growing at its slowest pace in almost three decades, the government has turned its focus to the infrastructure sector to spur on the world’s second-largest economy. It appears to be working: In 2016...
Revolutionised renewables?
A global energy shift is taking place. But can we rely on wind and solar on such a growing scale? Battery storage could provide much-needed stability. A global energy transition is under way. Year-on-year we are seeing record new additions of renewable energy capacity, along with rapidly falling costs, particularly for solar photovoltaics and wind power. This is leading to a major global shift...
In the wake of Grenfell…
Tougher codes and penalties are putting pressure on the building industry’s insurance cover, while raising questions over how far down the line liability should go The series of inquiries that followed the Grenfell tower disaster have greatly widened the insurance implications relating to high-rise residential accommodation, affecting just about all those responsible for the design...
Through the lens at Carillion
As a company, Carillion did practically everything wrong, yet its sudden demise has sent shockwaves through the business community. As regulators trawl through thousands of documents with a view to taking disciplinary action, the inevitable result is an intense scrutiny of directors and officers liability and transparency. As successive inquiries uncover evidence of, in the words of the...
Ligitation on the risk in Australia
Litigation on the rise in Australia Stirred into action by Grenfell and their own high-rise fires, Australian authorities are piling more responsibility on the construction industry. In mid-May, a year-long enquiry in Queensland found that flammable cladding may have been used on as many as 12,000 buildings in the state. Nearly 50 buildings are under investigation, including several hospitals. In...
