After many hours of analysis and debate, a panel of industry veterans has selected the winners of ENR’s 9th annual Global Best Projects competition. Like ENR’s popular regional and national U.S. competitions, Global Best Projects identifies and honors the project teams behind outstanding design and construction efforts of the past year.

But this competition stands apart from the others with the distinct rule that at least one firm involved in the project must be working outside of its home country, and projects are partially weighted by how globally diverse those teams are. None of the entries could participate if they had any construction-related fatalities, and construction had to be completed between January 2020 and May 2021.

The international construction industry submitted a robust slate of entries this year. This year’s class features 30 winning projects located in 21 different countries on six continents. These outstanding examples showcase the risks, rewards and hurdles overcome when designing and building internationally.

Judging the contest were: Erleen Hatfield, managing partner, Hatfield Group; Christopher Heger, vice president and chief innovation officer for OAC; David White, vice president and executive program director at Jacobs; Kevin Max, principal with KPMG; Gary Tulacz, retired senior editor of ENR; and Hans Van Winkle, president & CEO, Van Winkle Consulting.

Any judge with a conflict of interest in any particular category was assigned to a different category. The panel looked at projects in many markets and examined safety performance, innovations, challenges, and design and construction quality. They also considered how the project benefits the local community and/or the construction industry.
The panel had discretion to designate top selections as Global Best Projects winners in a variety of categories, and pick Award of Merit honorees as warranted.

All of the selected projects will be spotlighted in more detail in ENR’s Dec. 13 issue. In addition, that special issue will name one 2021 Global Project of the Year from the Global Best Project-level winners.
This year, anyone around the globe can celebrate these construction achievements and mingle with the teams behind the projects at our virtual awards event.

Airport/Port
Best Project: Tema Port Expansion Project – Phase One, located in Tema, Ghana. Submitted by AECOM and China Harbour Engineering Co. Ltd.
Award of Merit: GemaLink International Container Terminal – Civil Marine Works, located in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Submitted by Royal HaskoningDHV

To receive information about the Global Best Projects Awards Presentation in December, please visit:

https://www.enr.com/global-best-projects/mailing-list