New Office Annex at the U.S. Embassy

FEDERAL

New Office Annex
at the U.S. Embassy

Kampala, Uganda

In September 2017, Pernix was awarded the contract for the design and construction of the New Office Annex and Support Annex on the existing Embassy compound in Kampala, Uganda and an adjacent expansion site. The total site is just under 10 acres.

The project included the construction and commissioning of a new office annex, main, consular, and access facilities, a new support annex for facility maintenance and vehicular maintenance shops, utility building, and a partial underground parking structure for official and staff vehicles. Renovations to the Existing Office Building involved the conversion of existing Post 2 to New Post 1, construction of a new roof top satellite antenna pad, and converting vacated areas to new uses. The project also included ADA compliant civil and architectural features, Technical Security Services (TSS), and state-of-the-art life/safety systems. Site elements such as a new perimeter wall, underground utilities, underground fuel storage, roads, walkways, site lighting, and landscaping were incorporated.

Owner
Department Of State,
Overseas Buildings
Operations

Project Type
 Design/Build

Project Highlights

Construction phasing maintained continued full operation of the Embassy, executed within an active embassy site, requiring tight coordination with the USG, and contractor personnel to ensure limited disruption to the existing embassy’s operation.

The compound is completely self-sufficient, including power generation, a waste water treatment facility, and a potable water treatment facility.

This project is projected to receive LEED Silver status.

We continued construction efforts through the COVID-19 global pandemic, following local labor regulations, and working hand-in-hand with OBO and local government. Even with a heavily depleted workforce at times due to local restrictions and COVID outbreaks, we pushed progress forward.

Detailed phasing allowed for moving Compound Access Control facilities from old to new as the project progressed.

Our lean construction approach and culture embraced creating value, eliminating waste, and continuous improvement. This lean approach resulted in improvements in the design process, subcontractors, communication, coordination, cost, and schedule.

Digital coordination of all discipline drawings better identified interferences.

Navigating Challenges

This project has come with many challenges that we demonstrated our resiliency and ability to overcome. 

The project grade presented a challenging excavation process. Both the Embassy site and adjacent site have significant topographical slopes, ranging from 8.0% to 14.0% from the south high side to the low north side. The adjacent expansion site was regraded to accommodate a temporary gravel parking lot for the Embassy.

Keeping excavated areas safely open for work under heavy rains created difficult issues, while also maintaining safe access to the embassy.

The project site was tight and limited space posed several challenges with existing walls and roads. Temporary retaining walls were constructed as needed to minimize disruption to adjacent works.

The use of lean concrete helped with excavation during the rainy season, by excavating dry soil and pouring lean concrete to allow foundation pours to continue.

We built and operated our own concrete batch plant to address the limitations of local supply and delivery of ready mix in the area.

In addition to supply issues, extreme heat affected concrete temperature. This was initially managed with ice, then a chiller was installed at the batch plant to keep concrete water temperature down.

The project faced some constraints with local subcontractors and suppliers that could not meet production, quality, or schedules. We overcame the issues by providing staff, equipment and QC oversight as needed to meet the project’s schedule needs and high QC standards.

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