Hewlett takes the high road for green energy projects

Leeds-based Hewlett Civil Engineering, which celebrates its 25th anniversary this year, said it expects renewable energy contracts, which currently account for five per cent of its business, to rise to 15 per cent as it takes on more work.

The company, which is part of The Hewlett Group, installs wind turbines at farms and rural estate businesses as well as larger developments, and builds access roads to power stations.

It also helps to transmit power from wind farms to the National Grid. In total, its work in Scotland now accounts for 40 per cent of its turnover.

Managing director Alan Cooper said: “The power sector is relatively new but it’s now the biggest area we work in.”

Hewlett Civil Engineering operates through a number of different divisions: power and process, defence, highways, housing infrastructure and training, which each have their own management. Clients include Network Rail and the Ministry of Defence.

Recent work includes a contract worth in excess of £1.5m with Guardian Industries to carry out civil engineering work at its glass manufacturing plant in Goole, East Yorkshire.

Hewlett is also expanding overseas and has just launched its first operation in Oman in the Middle East.

The operation, called Hewlett Construction LLC, was set up this spring and is a joint venture with a local businessman, Nasser Al-Araimi, who is a 30 per cent shareholder.

In the longer term, the company plans to expand further in the Middle East, including Kuwait, Qatar and Saudi Arabia.

Mr Cooper said: “These countries have natural mineral deposits and oil and gas so they have not suffered during the recession.”

Mr Cooper said the group’s training division, which trains employees in the construction industry to work in the civil engineering sector, is making good progress with training centres in Cross Green, Leeds; Wolverhampton, and Perth in Scotland. It also has a driving test centre at its Leeds site for training digger and dumper truck drivers.

The group, which also includes Hewlett Rail, Hewlett Plant Hire, and Portford Homes, increased turnover to £45m in the year to March 31, 2011, up from £36m the previous year. The company reduced its pre-tax loss from £1.4m to £111,000.

The civil engineering business, the largest company within the group, increased its turnover to £40m from £35m.

Although turnover is now growing again at the group, it is still down on previous years. It peaked at £62m in 2008.

The housing infrastructure side of the business – Portford Homes – was particularly affected and it went from building more than 100 homes a year to about 30. “When there is nobody out there buying houses, there is little point in developing land for it,” said Mr Cooper. “Developers are also finding it challenging because they can’t get the funding for schemes. Our business has suffered as a result of that.”

However, the company recently won a contract with Redrow Homes to provide site infrastructure at a new development in Wakefield. In the last 18 months, the highways work has also reduced as government cuts have come into effect resulting in fewer new roundabouts and upgrades of highways.

The company has 420 staff, including temporary site workers and salaried staff – the number is on the rise again after the number fell to around 350 in 2009/10. “We had to make cuts with both staff and site workers,” said Mr Cooper. The company is still investing and recently spent £250,000 on a fleet of new vans.

Looking ahead, Mr Cooper said: “We are hopeful of growth over the next 12 months. Our civil engineering order book is quite healthy.

“We expect to grow our turnover to £45m this year and continue that growth.”