Fluor Signs Subcontract to Clean Up Navy Bases : Environment: International firm is aggressively marketing its cleanup services. Contract is one of three with a total value of $177 million.
Fluor Corp. has signed a one-year subcontract to clean up environmentally fouled U.S. Navy bases scattered across the Pacific Rim, one of three contracts announced Tuesday that have a combined valued of more than $177 million.
The Navy contract is the latest indication that Fluor Corp., an international engineering and construction company, is more aggressively marketing its environmental cleanup services, company officials and industry analysts said.
Fluor spokeswoman Deborah Land said the agreement is a “very significant” government contract that could mean steady business during the next 10 years for the Environmental Services Division of Fluor’s principal subsidiary, Fluor Daniel Inc.
Company officials were unable to put a specific value on the open-ended contract.
Land said the company has been adding environmental cleanup to its list of services for the past decade. Environmental cleanup techniques are becoming more lucrative as governments around the world are becoming more concerned about preserving the environment.
“We see this as a very significant area for Fluor Daniel to pursue,” Land said, adding that the division has tripled staff in the past year. The division expects to have 250 employees by year’s end. “It has significant growth prospects.”
In January, Fluor’s environmental division was awarded a contract to provide assistance to Olin Corp. for the cleanup of chemical plant sites in Virginia and Ohio.
The company said it was impossible to place a total value on its various environmental projects currently under way. But as an illustration of the future of the environmental cleanup industry, Land said, contracts for hazardous-waste cleanup alone are expected to jump from $8 billion this year to $23 billion by the end of 1993.
Land said that in the latest project, Fluor will work as a subcontractor with ERC Environmental and Energy Services Co.Inc., based in Fairfax, Va., which won a contract late last year with the Navy under its Comprehensive Long-Term Environmental Action Navy (CLEAN) program to clean up more than a dozen naval installations in Hawaii, New Zealand, Guam, the Philippines, Australia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Midway Island, Japan and South Korea.
Fluor will be responsible for checking the bases’ underground storage tanks for hazardous waste, clearing the facilities of cancer-causing asbestos, recovering underwater oil around the bases and preparing environmental documentation and permit applications, Land said.
Fluor Daniel’s Hydrocarbon Section, under a $177-million contract, will be providing engineering, procurement and construction services for Valero Refining & Marketing Co. in San Antonio, Tex., to build a facility for producing an additive that enhances the octane level of unleaded gasoline.
The facility will be built in Valero’s Corpus Christi plant, Land said. Completion of the project is scheduled for mid-1993.
The Hydrocarbon Section was also awarded a contract with an unspecified value to begin design of a new refinery for Corpoven, an affiliate of Petroleos de Venezuela, Land said. The plant, which will refine crude oil into gasoline, diesel and jet fuel, will be located in eastern Venezuela.
