Background

The San Francisco International Airport is an important gateway to Europe and Asia. It is the second busiest airport in California and the seventh busiest in the United States. SFO receives its Jet A fuel from a Kinder Morgan pipeline stored in on-site fuel tanks which have a storage capacity of approximately 14.5 million gallons and a usable storage capacity of approximately 10.2 million gallons. At SFO’s request, Burns & McDonnell is procuring this project to construct two new 90,000-barrel gross capacity (66,000-barrel usable capacity) tanks to accommodate increased demand at this busy international airport. The project scope will also include improvements to the existing containment drainage system for the two new tanks and improve overall operability. New cable trays will provide power and controls to both the new and existing tanks and will facilitate the planned electrical and controls upgrades for the facility.

Technical Approach

Mission Critical saw a strong opportunity to frame Anvil’s qualifications and capacity as a prime contractor for this Technical Proposal while also providing reasoning, data, and metrics for Anvil to use in future pursuits.

The complex underground infrastructure required for this project is Anvil’s specialty. The Anvil team has extensive experience at SFO – over 40 jobs on-site – but that work was completed as a subcontractor. As a disabled veteran-owned company, Anvil was often hired as a subcontractor to fulfill the DBE requirements of the prime contractor. This DBE status was an early boon for the firm, gaining experience and building relationships in the industry and at SFO, but it became a hindrance as they attempted to break into the prime contractor role. To help move them into the prime role, Anvil turned to Mission Critical as Pursuit Management Specialists.

The Mission Critical team took the brief Request for Proposal and interpreted the procuring entity’s judgment criteria and project goals for the Anvil team, laying a firmer foundation for the Technical Proposal document. Through focus groups and video conferences with the Anvil team, Mission Critical developed a ‘Basis of Design’ document and a proposal wireframe that was unlike anything Anvil had previously put together. From these new frameworks, our in-house design team worked to create a clear and concise document, while the writing team illustrated Anvil’s experience and their capacity to operate as a prime contractor.

Impact

The final Technical Proposal successfully communicated Anvil’s abilities, experience, and capacity and ultimately won them the job. In addition to a winning submission, Mission Critical also took this opportunity to develop new sets of unique data and metrics for Anvil which uniquely define their experience at SFO and within the San Francisco market.