Rolls-Royce has selected Škoda JS and Doosan Enerbility to deliver key nuclear island components, including reactor pressure vessel bodies, for its Small Modular Reactor (SMR) programme. The Czech and Korean suppliers will carry out pre‑production, design finalisation and manufacturing readiness work to secure long‑lead items and enable “designed for manufacture” reactor hardware. Initial SMR units are planned for Wylfa in the UK and Temelín in the Czech Republic, with a standardised fleet model intended to industrialise reactor build and stabilise long‑term supply chains.
Balfour Beatty has secured an £83m contract from Hub North Scotland to build the 12,143 m² Forres Academy secondary school in Moray for Moray Council, designed for 1,120 pupils under Phase 3 of the Scottish Government’s Learning Estate Investment Programme. The campus will include a full-size 3G artificial grass pitch and new car parking, replacing the existing school on the site. Delivery will draw on Balfour Beatty’s previous Moray school projects at Elgin High, Lossiemouth High and Linkwood Primary, with Hub North Scotland signalling additional training, employment and community benefits.
Rail infrastructure specialist GBR-Price Group has secured Barclays funding to buy its first owned premises, moving from rented facilities to support expansion of UK-wide rail track installation, platform construction and depot development. The group operates through four specialist businesses, with GBR-Price Rail Limited as the main delivery arm, and currently employs about 250 staff with turnover of roughly £15m in 2025. Owning a permanent base is intended to increase operational stability and capacity as demand for specialist rail engineering services continues to grow.
Oregon Timber Frame has completed the final phase of a £25m expansion at its Selkirk HQ, adding north and south factory extensions to 69,000 sq ft and 25,000 sq ft respectively and installing two automated panel lines to lift output from 3,500 to 5,000 timber frame house kits per year. Barratt Redrow plans to push capacity to 9,000 kits annually within two to three years, supported by 50 new manufacturing roles and up to 30 support posts, taking production capacity up 43%. A separate £40m, 187,000 sq ft factory in Derby, opened in 2023, underpins wider rollout of timber frame systems across England.
Heidelberg Materials UK and Kenson Highways have rebuilt Heathcote Avenue in Redbridge using evoZero carbon‑captured cement from Brevik, Norway, and low‑carbon asphalt mixes to cut embodied emissions. The scheme used 275 tonnes of binder course with 25% reclaimed asphalt and 6.5% ACLA, plus 248 tonnes of surface course containing CarbonLock bio‑binder produced via the Era 140 warm mix process at up to 40°C lower temperature. Initial calculations show more than 75 tonnes of CO₂ saved, with evoZero cement alone delivering over 35% of the reduction.
Old Oak and Park Royal Development Corporation has launched a search for a private sector partner for a £12bn, 20‑year joint venture to deliver the HS2 Old Oak Common‑linked regeneration. The partner will help masterplan and phase major rail‑led infrastructure, utilities and public realm over the two‑decade build‑out, integrating with the high‑speed and conventional rail interchange. For civil and geotechnical teams, the scale and duration signal long‑term demand for ground engineering, rail interface works and high‑density urban foundations on a constrained brownfield site.
Kubota dealer Lister Wilder has opened a new Salisbury depot at Lopcombe with four full-length service bays sized for the new 14‑tonne U145 excavator, doubling workshop capacity over its previous local site. Parts storage is four times larger than before, supporting £3m of stock and inter‑depot deliveries, with 60 mobile service engineers and three on‑site technicians as the firm recruits further service staff. The location is configured to support construction equipment customers from Lyme Regis to Bognor Regis and north to Marlborough and Newbury.
Graham has opened a new office in Cleator Moor, Cumbria, to support long-term nuclear infrastructure work including infrastructure upgrades at the Low Level Waste Repository in Drigg, where its team is committed on site until summer 2029. The premises will expand operational capacity for Graham’s civil engineering division and provide a shared base for its nationally operating building division, which already has multiple schemes in the North. Led by contracts director Alastair Lewis, the office is intended to put permanent staff “boots on the ground” and anchor local recruitment for nuclear and defence projects.
Italian telehandler manufacturer Faresin has entered a strategic partnership with French Caterpillar dealer Bergerat Monnoyeur to distribute its machines, including 100% electric models, across construction, industrial and agricultural sectors in France. The agreement brings low-emission, low-noise telehandlers into Bergerat Monnoyeur’s portfolio, targeting work in sensitive urban and industrial environments where conventional diesel plant faces tighter constraints. Customers are promised integrated product supply with technical support, connected services and local dealer presence, which could simplify fleet decarbonisation planning on mixed Cat–Faresin sites.
Maraen Port of Nigg has awarded McLaughlin & Harvey a £30m contract, supported by a £10m Highlands and Islands Enterprise grant, to build the Eastern Inner Dock Quay (EIDQ) to service Scottish offshore wind projects. The works will focus on heavy-duty quay construction and ground-bearing capacity upgrades to handle large turbine components and installation vessels. For civil and geotechnical teams, the project signals continued demand for high-capacity quayside foundations and pavements tailored to offshore wind logistics in constrained dock environments.
AtkinsRéalis has secured a five-year professional services framework with EDF and Sizewell C, extending its existing role on the Hinkley Point C nuclear new-build. The appointment covers continued engineering and technical support for Hinkley Point C’s twin EPR units and adds a new scope at Sizewell C, which is intended to replicate much of Hinkley’s design. For geotechnical, civil and structural teams, this signals sustained demand for nuclear-grade design, verification and constructability input across both major UK coastal sites.
Paragon has rebranded as Tilbury Douglas Fit Out, consolidating the group’s Cat A and Cat B fit-out, internal refurbishment, workplace transformation and technically led interior delivery services under a single Tilbury Douglas identity. Managing director Jack Dixon, appointed in December 2025, said the move is intended to align the specialist fit-out arm with the wider contractor’s reputation and give clients greater confidence in complex interior projects. CEO Craig Tatton reported an order book now exceeding £1.6bn, framing the rebrand as part of a five-year growth plan across the UK.
Keltbray chief executive Karl Goose is leaving the specialist engineering and construction group by mutual agreement after just over nine months in the role, having joined from Ferrovial in August 2025 following a 26‑year career there. Executive vice chairman Peter Burnside, formerly Keltbray’s chief financial officer and with eight years at the company, will take over as CEO, bringing two decades of prior collaboration with executive chair Brendan Kerr. The leadership change comes as Keltbray continues to pursue its existing group strategy and expansion into new UK and international markets.
A 2.5‑tonne Volvo ECR25D excavator advertised on Irish auction site Donedeal was stolen from Redmond Machinery & Motors after fraudsters used cloned company details from a Northern Ireland firm, falsified bank transfer confirmations and anonymous online communication to “purchase” and move the machine across the border within two hours. The excavator is now recorded on The Equipment Register (TER), a European stolen plant database, whose head of recoveries Gareth Barkwill warns that organised criminals are using increasingly sophisticated impersonation and payment documentation. For plant owners and buyers, rigorous ID checks and TER searches on pre‑owned machinery are becoming critical due diligence.
Birmingham Airport (BHX) head of planning, transport and strategy Nikki Baines set out how a coordinated surface access strategy is being used to sequence major civils investment and build long-term operational resilience. Her approach links highway and rail connectivity upgrades with terminal and apron capacity planning, so that junction layouts, public transport interchanges and car park configurations are sized and phased against forecast passenger growth. For engineers, the message is that early, data-led access modelling can de-risk later airside works, reduce retrofit of road layouts and protect resilience during construction.
The UK highways sector is updating the 10-year-old Well-managed Highway Infrastructure code to capture changes in asset management, risk-based maintenance and funding pressures since its last issue. AtkinsRéalis technical director (highways) is helping steer revisions on lifecycle planning, whole-life cost modelling and resilience of pavements, structures and drainage to more frequent extreme weather. For asset owners and term-maintenance contractors, the refresh signals closer alignment of inspection regimes, condition data, and intervention levels with current DMRB standards and local authority budget constraints.
Work has begun on a £3.2M scheme to strengthen a 132‑year‑old railway bridge in Leeds, ensuring it remains safe and serviceable for both rail and highway traffic. The project focuses on replacing key bridge sections and upgrading structural elements to carry modern train loadings while maintaining road clearance beneath. For geotechnical and structural teams, the works imply careful staging around live rail operations and constrained urban access, with close control of temporary works and differential movement between new and existing fabric.
Upgrades to Hardinge Street, a key section of the Cobb Highway through Deniliquin’s commercial precinct, are progressing as the New South Wales Government targets safer access and smoother traffic for roughly 6000 vehicles per day. Works focus on improving the urban highway cross-section and intersections along this main north–south freight and local access route, which currently carries mixed heavy and light vehicle traffic. For designers and contractors, staging and maintaining capacity on a constrained main street corridor will be central to construction planning and temporary traffic management.
Bridge works in New South Wales are being accelerated with a combined $114 million in joint Federal–State funding for stage two of a new bridge at Richmond, a historic flood‑prone town in Greater Sydney. The package advances detailed design and early works for the replacement crossing of the Hawkesbury River, intended to improve flood immunity and traffic capacity on a key regional freight and commuter route. For civil and geotechnical teams, the funding certainty brings forward foundation investigations, hydraulic modelling and construction staging around the existing bridge.
Bridge launches, where pre-assembled decks are slid or pushed into position over live railways, motorways or rivers, are being used more frequently in the UK to cut possession times and traffic closures. Engineers are dealing with complex temporary works, including incremental launching with nose sections, high-capacity strand jacks and PTFE bearing slide paths, often with tolerances of only a few millimetres over spans exceeding 50m. The approach shifts risk towards detailed staging analysis, real-time monitoring of deflection and friction, and strong contractor–client trust in temporary works design and contingency planning.
Engineering in Antarctica is explored in the latest Engineers Collective podcast, focusing on how civil and structural engineers design and build in −40°C conditions, on moving ice and permafrost. Guests discuss foundations on blue ice runways, snow-loaded steel frames for research stations, and logistics for transporting heavy plant and prefabricated modules by icebreaker and ski-equipped aircraft. The episode also examines corrosion of steel in saline, sub-zero environments and the use of insulated, elevated piles to limit heat transfer into ice and frozen ground.
The Environment Agency is moving from isolated project trials to a capital programme-wide deployment model for low‑carbon technologies across its flood defence and water management schemes. Standardised assessment, procurement and design frameworks are being applied to repeatable assets such as pumping stations, embankments and culverts, enabling faster roll‑out of options like low‑carbon concrete mixes and electrified plant. For contractors and designers, this signals earlier whole‑life carbon targets at framework level and greater scope to industrialise low‑carbon details across multiple sites rather than negotiating them scheme by scheme.
VolkerRail has installed the first set of switches and crossings on the Midland Main Line to connect the Radlett Strategic Rail Freight Interchange, a key step in creating a new rail-served logistics hub in Hertfordshire. The works involve integrating new turnouts and associated signalling and overhead line equipment into a live main line corridor carrying high-frequency passenger and freight services. Track and civils teams now move to subsequent S&C installations and plain line works, which will govern final line speeds, axle loads and freight path capacity into the SRFI.
Skanska has been named preferred bidder by the US Department of Transportation and Amtrak as Master Developer for the New York Penn Station Transformation Project, one of the busiest rail hubs in North America. The role is expected to cover integrated station redevelopment above active tracks, complex phasing to maintain high passenger throughput, and coordination with existing Amtrak, NJ Transit and MTA infrastructure. Geotechnical and civil teams should anticipate constrained urban excavation, structural upgrades around ageing foundations, and stringent operational and safety requirements during construction.
Geomechanics, Streamlined.
© 2026 Geomechanics.io. All rights reserved.
