Week 3: Day 19

Delays. Disputes and Arbitration + Sustainable Construction/LEED Certification

Today's lecture was divided into two parts.
During the first part, Mr. Ian Harper gave a a general overview of the FIDIC Standard contract forms, more specifically the Red Book (Conditions of Contract for Construction). We further discussed the concepts of EOT (Extension of Time) and LD (Liquidated Damages). It was an interactive session where every student read a part about Claims, Disputes, Litigation and Arbitration.

One thing we learned from this lecture is that it is always better to go for an amicable settlement, in order to keep business relationships stable.

The second part of the lecture mainly focused on the importance of Green Building nowadays, in a world where the Construction field  produces 30-40% of the toxic emissions in the atmosphere. We also got introduced to the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED), its main objectives and some recent statistics and fact about the application of Green buildings.

Our lectures comprised few videos concerning the two topics, which were provided by the right hand and facilitator of the program Mr. Bassam Haddad!
The last video was a quick overview about Abu Dhabi's Masdar City, which will be a complete Green Environment Friendly city with no emissions at all.

In the afternoon we went on a site visit to the "Three Villas" Project.  The villas are each identical and being built to sell/rent as permanent homes.  The villas are very upscale homes.  The built up area is 43,600 sq ft and each villa has a ground level, first level, and a flat roof.  The structures are made of traditional concrete.  The flooring is mainly marble with some walnut wood finish.  The walls are painted over plaster.  The villas each have a pool that has a wave-resistance swimming feature, and a fountain feature.  The original contract cost of this project is AED 34,000,000 (approx. $9,000,000).  Work was started in April 2013 and is expected to finish this July.  DCC is going to complete the job three months ahead of schedule! 

Bedroom, marble tiling black area is plywood sheeting, a wood surface finish is going to be placed on top

One crane is still onsite bringing some MEP equipment (Air conditioning units etc...)  up to the roofs