Description

Engineering Evidence for High-Value Energy and Infrastructure Disputes

Dargavel Engineering combines decades of practical onshore and offshore experience with expert witness, technical due diligence and arbitration support for complex engineering disputes worldwide.

When litigation or arbitration concerns the design, construction, commissioning or performance of major industrial assets, the technical issues can be exceptionally complex. Pipelines, process facilities, offshore installations and energy infrastructure involve multiple engineering disciplines, extensive project documentation and questions that may reach back through years of design and construction decisions.

For solicitors and counsel, the right engineering expert must do more than understand the underlying technology. They must investigate the evidence methodically, identify the issues that genuinely matter and communicate their conclusions clearly to lawyers, tribunals and courts.

This is the specialist territory of Dargavel Engineering Limited.

Practical engineering experience brought into the legal arena

Established in 1995, Dargavel Engineering is an international engineering consultancy providing technical, due diligence and expert witness services across the energy and industrial sectors. Its experience encompasses project management, construction supervision, plant integrity, rotating and static equipment, piping and layout, materials and welding, non-destructive testing, procurement, commissioning, start-up, operations and maintenance.

The company provides services worldwide from its bases in the United Kingdom and West Africa, giving its engineers valuable experience of projects operating across different jurisdictions, contractual environments and technical standards. Dargavel Engineering’s corporate profile describes capabilities extending throughout the complete project lifecycle—from feasibility and conceptual studies to construction, commissioning and operational support.

This breadth can be particularly valuable where a dispute cannot be understood by examining one isolated component. A pipeline failure, delayed start-up, plant-performance issue or safety-related incident may involve the interaction of design decisions, procurement, construction quality, commissioning procedures, maintenance records and operational practice.

Independent analysis of complex technical disputes

Dargavel Engineering provides expert witness and independent technical due diligence services for onshore and offshore pipelines and process facilities. Its work includes:

• Field inspections and condition assessments
• Cost and programme estimating
• Technical fault-tree analysis
• Risk assessment and outcome-scenario analysis
• Expert witness investigation and reporting
• Engineering surveys
• Front End Engineering and Design
• Construction and commissioning matters
• Pre-Start-up Safety Reviews and plant start-up

The company’s principal areas of expertise include oil, gas and petrochemicals, process and industrial engineering, minerals and metallurgy, mechanical and manufacturing design, and environmental health and safety. Its wider expertise also extends across power generation, utilities, renewable energy and nuclear-sector engineering.

The ability to inspect physical assets while also analysing design information, project programmes, cost data and operating records allows the experts to consider both the immediate technical question and the wider sequence of events that produced it.

Experience before courts and international tribunals

Dargavel Engineering has provided expert witness services for high-profile international clients, with experience of matters presented before the High Court and international arbitration tribunals.

Managing Director and Consultant Engineer Robin Dargavel BEng (Hons), CEng has cross-examination and expert-conferencing experience in ICC tribunal proceedings, the London High Courts, London County Courts, The Court of Session Scotland and the Dubai International Arbitration Centre.

A Chartered Engineer who founded the consultancy in 1995, Mr Dargavel has extensive experience in the FEED (front-end engineering design), detailed design and project and construction management of pipelines and facilities across the oil and gas, power-generation and utilities industries. His international project background includes onshore and offshore wellheads, pipelines and process facilities, including subsea and cross-country pipeline projects. His published profile identifies experience on major projects associated with Statoil, ExxonMobil, BP and other international operators.

This combination of practical project involvement and tribunal experience is especially important in cases where the expert must explain not only what occurred, but why it occurred, whether the relevant engineering decisions were reasonable and what consequences flowed from them.

A multidisciplinary expert team

Dargavel Engineering can also draw upon a wider group of consultants covering pipeline engineering, turbine controls, functional and technical safety, instrumentation, project management, quality, health, safety and environment, and well-control engineering.

The company’s named expert witness engineers include Robin Dargavel, Andrew Davis, Jan Mencel, Andrew Band and David Newman.

Among them, Andrew Davis brings more than 30 years’ as a Lead Instrumentation and Controls Engineer in the oil and gas industry. Highly experienced in the FEED, design and implementation, construction, completions, commissioning, operation and maintenance of major projects.

Jan Mencel BSC (Hons) has over 40 years’ experience (20 years in the UK AND EU and 20 years overseas International Projects) in the Energy and Oil / Gas industries of which 25 years have been spent in Design/Consultancy work (design work and site supervision) and 15 years working in the Contracting industry. The experience has been gained on major Energy, Oil, Gas and Civil Engineering projects which includes Gas Fired Power Stations CHP (Combined Heat and Power Plants), Major Oil, Gas and Water Transmission Pipelines, Flow lines, Pipeline Above Ground Installations, Manifold stations, Telecommunication Sites, Petrochemical Refineries including Storage Tanks, an Aluminium Smelting Plant, Power Stations, Water, Oil and Gas Fired Power Stations.

Andrew Band BSc (Hons), CEng has more than 30 years’ experience in engineering and project-management roles involving planning, estimating and risk management. His recent work has included expert witness assignments and quantum delay analysis on major European infrastructure projects. This experience can be particularly relevant where technical causation is closely connected with programme disruption, delay or project cost.

David Newman BSc (Hons), MSc, CEng has over 40 years’ experience within Oil & Gas Engineering and Management, having undertaken national and international projects addressing onshore, offshore and subsea oil and gas infrastructure in design, construction, installation, operations, risk-based asset integrity, inspection, maintenance and repair (IMR). With specific expertise in Asset Integrity Management, controlling and managing risks associated with oil and gas operational assets to ensure safety and reliability over its life cycle. A hands-on individual with excellent interpersonal and communications skill at Government, Board of Management, Client, Engineering and Management disciplines, Certifying and Test Houses levels. Special interest in Oil and Gas Education and Training for graduate to senior engineers and managers having delivered specialist training to national and international delegates both at home and worldwide.

 

Supporting legal teams from inspection to testimony

For those conducting energy, construction, engineering and commercial disputes, early access to the appropriate technical expertise can help define the issues before positions become entrenched.

Dargavel Engineering can support legal teams through initial document review, site and condition surveys, technical due diligence, causation analysis, cost and programme assessment, expert reporting, meetings of experts, conferencing with counsel and oral evidence.

Its central strength lies in connecting the physical reality of engineering projects with the evidential demands of litigation and arbitration—providing carefully researched, technically grounded opinions on the key issues in dispute.

For instructions or an initial discussion:

 

Robin Dargavel BEng (Hons) CEng

Consultant Engineer / Managing Director

Dargavel Engineering Limited http://www.dargavel.com

Dene Ghyll, Bridgefoot, Workington, Cumbria CA14 1YE United Kingdom

 E-mail: robin@dargavel.com or enquiries@dargavel.com 

Tel: +44 (0) 1900 62613 Mobile (U.K.) No: +44 (0) 770 815 5770 Mobile (Italy) No. +39 333 5355896