South African consulting engineering firms lauded by CESA

Consulting Engineers South Africa (CESA) recently hosted its annual Excellence in Engineering congress, an event that celebrates companies, projects and individuals that have made a large contribution to South Africa’s engineering landscape in the past year. 

“These award ceremony highlights the role that engineers, consultants and their clients play in providing excellence in engineering for economic development and job creation,” explained Chris Campbell, the chief executive of Consulting Engineers South Africa. 

On the night, which took place at the Vodacom Dome in Midrand, the spotlights were placed on some of the most impressive advancements realised in South Africa’s infrastructure and building environment sectors, with a total of fifteen awards handed out to those that belonged to the year’s cream of the crop. 

Knight Piésold Consulting, an engineering consultancy established in South Africa in 1921 with currently over 750 professionals globally, took home two awards, that of ‘Best International Project’ for its work on the Azambi Hydropower Project and that of ‘Best Mentoring Company of the Year’. Australia-headquartered Aurecon saw its South African division also scoop two awards. The firm won the award for best engineering projects in the categories .between R50million and R250’ (Docklands Apartments in Cape Town) and ‘less than R50million’ (Leliefontein Pump-as-Turbine Station for Drakenstein Municipality).

SMEC, another larger Australian-origin engineering and infrastructure consultancy (now part of Surbana Jurong) with a presence in South Africa, won one award (‘Roads and Bridges Projects’) and was commended for another (‘Best International Project’).

This year’s ceremony took place a time when infrastructure development in the South African economy is at a cross roads. The state of the country’s infrastructure is begging for upgrade, yet the state is struggling with financing many much needed megaprojects. However, awareness and investment too are likely to rise in the coming years – President Cyril Ramaphosa’s recent government plans have bombarded infrastructure and the building environment into key pillars of the Vision 2030 ad the National Development Plan. 

The night’s winners

An overview of all winners of the Excellence in Engineering 2019 awards:

• Lifetime Industry Achievement Award: Graham Burrows, a renowned specialist in water and sewer pump design and analysis.
• Young Engineer of the Year: Jeshika Ramchund.
• Engineering Excellence for projects with a value of over R250million: Aecom for Growthpoint New Lakeside Office in Centurion.
• Engineering Excellence for projects between R50million and R250million: Aurecon for Docklands Apartments, Cape Town for FWJK Developments.
• Engineering Excellence for projects with a value of less than R50million: Aurecon for the Leliefontein Pump-as-Turbine Station for Drakenstein Municipality in the Western Cape.
• Roads and Bridges Projects: SMEC for the Mount Edgecombe Interchange on the N2, Section 26 for The South African National Roads Agency.
• Best International Project: Knight Piésold Consulting for the Azambi Hydropower Project in the DRC for Kibali Gold Mine.
• Visionary Client of the Year: Black Mountain Mining, a subsidiary of Vedanta Zinc International.
• Business Excellence: BVi Consulting Engineers.
• Small Company of the Year: ADA Consulting Engineers.
• Mentoring Company of the Year: Knight Piésold Consulting.
• Mentor of the Year: Kim Timm, from Aecom.
• Job Shadow Initiative: Mariswe.
• Branch of the Year: CESA's Western Cape Branch.