In southwestern Louisiana, "we have been involved with outreach to high school students, getting them informed about craft training with craft job fairs," says "Red" Lester, general manager of Triad's Lake Charles office. "We bring them information about our crafts, the benefits of this type of a career, information about job opportunities and wage rates available."

Safety Initiatives

The Newtron Group was able to improve some key safety statistics last year while its revenue was heading upward. Its EMR is now the lowest in company history at 0.43, down from 0.57 in the 2013 fiscal year.

Last year, Triad Electric & Controls won the 2013 Hal G. Ginn Safety Excellence Award for best overall safety performance among industrial contractors. Last year, Newtron Beaumont LLC won the Roy Comeaux Award for Safety Training Excellence at the ISTC Awards Banquet, the highest award the group bestows—it won the award two out of the last three years.

"A big part of why we're successful from a safety standpoint comes from the fact that we've got long-term supervisors who know our expectations, policies, procedures and everything that helps drive the program," says Mark Richardson, corporate safety manager for the company. "We also put a lot of work on the front end of a project. We spend the money, time and effort, where I—and the regional safety manager, the project manager and superintendent—will make a site visit and create a detailed hazard assessment before anyone actually shows up on site, and we eliminate any hazard we are capable of eliminating at that time. We think that goes a long way toward prevention."

The Newtron Group has a staff of four certified safety professionals as well, "and for a company our size, that's pretty rare," Richardson adds.

Abundant Projects

Work is plentiful in the region, and the number of projects is growing. "Contract values continue to go up. Almost all portions of a project—material, labor, insurance, benefits, etc.—have risen on a steady basis over the past five years," Beard says.

Beard expects to see continued opportunities. "The industrial expansion in the Lake Charles area will certainly be interesting to participate in. On top of the multibillion dollar expansion at Sasol, there are multiple LNG terminals planned in the area, all of which are very substantial projects," he says. "We continue to experience strong backlogs in our Baton Rouge, Port Arthur and Houston operations. The prospects for future work appear to be strong as well."

In Beaumont, Texas, work includes a project at ChevronPhillips in Port Arthur to build a steam generating facility to power the firm's refinery, says Mike Defee, general manager of Newtron's Beaumont office.

The Newtron Group was involved with three consecutive projects at the LyondellBasell facility in Channelview, Texas, over the past several years. The firm was responsible for E&I design and construction, says Carlyn "Huff" Hoffpauir, senior project manager with Honeywell. The first was the $3-million Isopropyl Alcohol Migration Project in late 2011. "The quality of the work by The Newtron Group so impressed the LyondellBasell construction representative, he said the installation by Newtron was to be the benchmark on how future projects will be gauged," Hoffpauir says.

Then, on the $10-million Methanol Refurbishment Project, the construction team had to reduce the overall project schedule by five months at the start. "With Newtron's management expertise, professionalism, teamwork, quality deliverables, focus on safety and eye on the bottom line, this project met every major project milestone to date," Hoffpauir adds.

"The Newtron Group has proven to be a successful win-win partnership for Honeywell, myself and The Newtron Group. They are an excellent company due to their value-added approach in all aspects of their offerings. And their commitment to both the bottom line and customer satisfaction is unparalleled in this industry," Hoffpauir says.