Nordic contractor NCC and the Swedish National Road Administration (NRA) have reached a definitive settlement with regards to NCC’s lawsuit against the NRA for additional costs incurred on the Southern Link highway project in Stockholm (T&TI, December 2002, p14).
NCC was awarded a contract worth US$88.8M in 1998 for work including the blasting and shotcrete lining of tunnels, orders for supplementary work amounting to US$23.9M were also placed.
The dispute arose from the use of shotcrete as the tunnel lining system. The use of shotcrete was decided upon by the NRA’s design, but NCC said that shotcrete was not the best method of sealing the tunnel and was resulting in significant delays to the project’s construction schedule, with the associated costs.
As part of the settlement, NCC will receive US$14M exclusive of value added tax in additional compensation. The NRA has agreed to process suspended payments and refrain from requiring NCC to pay and delay penalties. As a result, NCC has now withdrawn its lawsuit.
