【Haichuan EPC】Core Contents of EPC Project Planning

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PC project planning is a crucial preliminary task for engineering project bidding and subsequent implementation; it serves as the key mechanism for integrating resources, avoiding risks, and defining directions. Its quality directly affects the success rate of bidding as well as the effectiveness of project management throughout its entire lifecycle. The following outlines the main aspects of EPC project planning from six core dimensions: 1. Project Overview – It specifies the key technical and economic indicators of the project, including core information such as the scale of construction, construction standards, investment estimates, timeline requirements, quality standards, main functional objectives, and key technical parameters. Review the current progress of the project, including actual situations such as approval for initiation, the design phase, and site preparation, to identify the tasks that have been completed and those that still need to be carried out. Comprehensively analyze the favorable factors for project implementation, such as policy support, technological maturity, adequate resource availability, and synergy with the surrounding environment ； Identify the adverse factors accurately, such as complex geological conditions, tight schedules, scarce market resources, strict policy constraints, and difficulties in external coordination, and propose preliminary approaches to address them. II. Organizational Structure and Staff Arrangement: Establish a specialized organizational structure that meets the project’s requirements, clarify the hierarchical divisions and responsibility boundaries among the decision-making, execution, and support levels, to ensure smooth instruction transmission and clear assignment of responsibilities. Develop a core staffing plan that, based on the professional requirements of the project, identifies candidates for key positions such as project manager, design leader, technical lead, cost manager, and coordination officer; it also specifies the qualification requirements, job responsibilities, and collaboration mechanisms for each position. Establish a professional support team comprising specialists in areas such as technology, procurement, business affairs, and security. Define the responsibilities of each team member, the work processes, and the channels for communication and coordination, to ensure the efficient progress of project work. III. Design Plan: Develop a detailed schedule for the production of drawings, specifying the deadlines for the delivery of construction drawings and detailed design documents for each specialty, to ensure that the design outputs meet the requirements for subsequent bidding and construction preparations. Determine the start dates and completion deadlines for internal and third-party drawing reviews, clarify the time frame for addressing the feedback from these reviews, and simultaneously set the submission date, format, and recipient for the final design results. Reserve flexible time for design optimization, and establish an emergency supplementary drawing mechanism to address potential design changes or technical adjustments, thereby ensuring the timeliness and suitability of the design outcomes. IV. Project Planning: Scope and Technical Planning: Reasonably define the boundaries of each contract section and the contractual interfaces, and clarify the work contents, responsibility allocations, and coordination requirements for each section ； Formulate core technical standards and construction specifications to clarify the technical requirements and key points of quality control for critical processes. Progress and prerequisite planning: Break down the key milestones in the project timeline, identify the critical dates for commencement, main construction phases, completion, and acceptance, and define the prerequisites for each of these milestones (such as the delivery of drawings, handover of the site, and completion of approvals), thereby establishing a closed-loop system for progress control. Site and Resource Planning: Plan the overall layout of the site, including the arrangement of construction areas, material storage sites, transportation routes, and temporary facilities ； Formulate a personnel deployment plan and equipment allocation scheme, specifying the number of personnel, equipment models, and arrival times for each stage ； Advance the progress of site handover by defining the deadlines and standards for completing the three connections and one leveling (water supply, electricity supply, road access, and site leveling), the installation of temporary water and electricity supplies, and the construction of construction fences. Support and assurance planning: Determine the locations for office spaces and living areas as well as the construction standards; clarify the responsibilities of the main contractor and subcontractors in terms of cooperation (such as vertical transportation, sharing of temporary facilities, coordination of concurrent tasks, etc.) ； Establish a quality assurance system that defines quality acceptance standards, process control measures, and procedures for handling defective products ； Establish management requirements for safe and civilized construction, covering aspects such as safety protection, dust control, noise management, and environmental protection measures. V. Cost Planning: Conduct comprehensive market price research covering price fluctuations for main materials, auxiliary materials, equipment, labor, and machinery rental, and establish a price information database to provide a basis for cost estimation. Develop a budget management plan that outlines the procedures and timelines for budget preparation, review, and adjustment, thereby ensuring the accuracy and timeliness of budget formulation ； Conduct an analysis of indicator levels, compare cost indicators of similar projects, and optimize the cost structure of this project. Set cost limit standards, and by taking into account project investment estimates and market conditions, determine the upper limits for cost control in various fields and at different stages ； Cost comparison analyses are conducted during the design phase to evaluate the economic viability of different design options, thereby achieving coordinated optimization of design and cost. Advance the work related to aligning contract costs, clarify key terms such as the contract pricing method, principles for price adjustments, and settlement procedures, identify cost risk factors in advance, and formulate corresponding countermeasures. VI. Procurement Planning: Develop a contract planning framework to define the types, quantities, and timing of contracts required for a project, and to clarify the scope of work and responsibility boundaries for each contract, thereby avoiding overlaps or omissions in contracts. Determine the core elements of the bidding plan, clarify the scope of the bidding (including categories such as works, goods, and services), the bidding principles (openness, fairness, impartiality, and selection of the best candidate), and the division of responsibilities among the organizations responsible for organizing the bidding. Select an appropriate bidding method; based on the characteristics of the project and relevant regulations, determine whether to use open bidding, invited bidding, etc.; and clarify the channels for publishing bidding announcements, the requirements for prequalification, and the standards for preparing bidding documents. A well-structured contract should define key terms such as the contract pricing model (fixed total price, fixed unit price, cost-plus, etc.), payment methods, performance guarantees, and liability for breach of contract, in order to ensure the enforceability of the contract and effective risk management.