Perth, Australia visit – 13th to 22nd March 2010

The modern day gold rush?

At Mtech Consult we are used to requests to speak at construction conferences around the world on the benefits of using offsite manufacturing and modern methods of construction, but the call on a cold November day last year, conjured up thoughts of sun, sea, sand and cool beer more than most.

Organisers, IIR Conferences, were planning a conference in Perth, Western Australia, on modular building technology for the mining industry, which was to be held in mid-March. They asked Mtech to present the key note address to the two-day conference, on how the UK and Europe in general, were adopting and exploiting modular building techniques within traditionally built permanent construction.

How quickly can you say yes? Four months later and I was on my way to Perth to showcase exemplar modular building projects, specifically the Caledonian Building System’s Paragon Tower, an 18 storey student residence and affordable housing development in London, and Fleming Development’s 24 storey, 800 student apartment project in Wolverhampton, using the Vision modular building system.

The conference was unashamedly focussed on the mining sector in Western Australia, which is hardly surprising as this burgeoning sector is creating the equivalent of a modern day gold rush. With over one third of the world’s known coal reserves, iron ore and uranium in abundance, this industry has not experienced the slow down that has affected much of the rest of the worlds trading nations. The projects are vast. To set up one new mine will require an infrastructure investment of $64b AUD (£38b GBP), including ports, power stations, railroads and a complete town.

Modular buildings have a long history in Australia for the rapid provision of welfare and camp accommodation. These camps have come a long way since the early mining days of the 1950’s. Today’s modern camps provide all the facilities and services that you would expect from a small town. They can accommodate up to 5,000 workers together with support staff, and increasingly spouses and families.

The camps are frequently established and managed by specialist outsourcing companies, and over the years these companies have developed a very clear understanding of what they need from modular building manufacturers. Poor quality, low specification cabins will no longer suffice.

This massive resurgence in the mining sector in Australia is creating a significant imbalance for the country. The majority of the country’s small population lives on the south and east coast, traditionally sheep country. The mines are all in the far from hospitable western and northern fringes of Australia.

The demand for skilled operatives in these remote areas means that in urban areas there are too few building trade skills to meet the construction needs. Recent figures published by the Australian government indicate that the construction pipeline for Western Australia alone is some $200b AUD (£120b GBP), with housing a major part of this demand. Add to this the government’s aim to dramatically grow immigration to counteract the country’s aging population, and there is undoubtedly a forthcoming building boom across Australia of major proportions.

The housing demand alone to meet the government’s planned target of growing the country’s population from around 20m to over 30m by 2050 is staggering by UK proportions. The country has already committed to substantial build programmes in the education sector, similar to the UK with over $14.7b AUD (£9b GBP) earmarked for the Federal government’s “Building the Education Revolution” for new classrooms across Australia. Similar expansion plans are in place to create student accommodation, and Unite, one of the UK’s major providers, is already building in Australia to meet this demand. They are apparently targeting to create over 10,000 student bedrooms within the next 10 years.

This all adds up to very significant growth, and the obvious shortage of construction skills means that offsite manufacturing techniques will need to play a key part in delivering this construction growth. While Australia has a long history of pioneering innovative construction methods such as light steel frame and mobile homes, there are real opportunities for the country to exploit offsite building technologies in a major way across all construction sectors in addition to supporting the new mining “gold rush”.

Martin Goss
Managing Director
Mtech Consult