Bergelectric, one of the nation’s largest and most experienced electrical contractors, used its advanced preconstruction and prefabrication capabilities to build the electrical system at the new Universal Health Services (UHS) West Henderson Hospital.
After successfully teaming with SR Construction to complete the original UHS Henderson Hospital in 2016, as well as a six-story Patient Tower addition in 2021, Bergelectric teamed once again with SR Construction to build the new UHS West Henderson Hospital campus—a brand new healthcare campus in West Henderson, NV. The hospital site is approximately 23 acres, and the overall campus—including medical office buildings and a parking garage—expands the campus to approximately 40 acres.
The new acute care hospital with a cardiovascular specialty now has 150 patient beds with the potential to expand to 450 patient beds. The hospital now includes a 36-bay emergency department, surgical suites including heart and hybrid suites, endoscopy suites, cardiac catheterization labs, an electrophysiology lab to treat heart rhythm disorders, an interventional radiology/special procedures lab to treat neurological diagnoses, and an inpatient nursing care units.
The UHS West Henderson Hospital campus is backed by a central utility plant (CUP) with an N+1 design ensuring system availability to the hospital in the event of a component failure. The new CUP included the following electrical features: The build-out of (1) 4000A Switchgear with (2) redundant 4000A services from the utility—with plans to double this. The Emergency distribution has (1) 5000A switchgear that is currently powered by (2) 1750kW Generators with the ability to expand to a total of (4) in the future. The CUP facility currently is wholly backed up by (14) individual ATSs and is expandable to (18). Equipment power has been designed and coordinated to have an A and B system to have increased diversity for any planned maintenance and outage future expansion.
“Switchgear procurement was a huge challenge. Our main equipment originally had a 72-week lead time, which did not fit the project schedule. By working with the switchgear manufacturer, we expedited the procurement time to meet the project’s fast-paced schedule,” said Bergelectric Project Manager Shawn Fehring.
With a LEAN Construction approach—including Pull Planning—and innovation at the front of mind, Bergelectric had to rely heavily on their in-house Building Information Modeling (BIM) resources due to the project’s high-level requirements for BIM (Level LOD 400). Our BIM efforts also allowed Bergelectric to maximize its prefabrication capabilities for the hospital campus— including advanced conduit assemblies created and assembled at Bergelectric’s prefabrication warehouse in Las Vegas.
Innovation has been at the forefront of the project since early in the preconstruction process. “The project team takes innovation seriously,” said Fehring. “We had an “Innovation Team” that meets weekly to strategize trade-specific and project-specific approaches.”
Other innovative features used by Bergelectric included:
Continuous Flow Delivery—This process ensures that every part of the building process transitions to the next one smoothly.
Just- In-Time Deliveries—The delivery of critical components just as they are ready to be installed by Bergelectric field crews. Many of these components are built and stored at Bergelectric’s off-site prefabrication warehouse until prepared for installation.
Mobile Material Carts (aka Shark Cages)—Custom onsite mobile material carts, which are pre-filled with materials by vendors and delivered onsite, allow for easy material distribution and eliminate the need for sizeable onsite storage areas.
Prefabricated Underground Electrical Cubes—In a controlled environment, Bergelectric prefabricated the entire main electrical room assembly above ground before shipment to the job site.
TopCon Total Station—A tool that transfers coordinated layout points from the 3D BIM model to an electronic device in the field for increased accuracy and mistake elimination.
“Our ability to prefabricate crucial components in a controlled environment is where Bergelectric shines,” said Bergelectric Regional Vice President Justin Knippel. “We can build complex electrical systems at our warehouse before shipping the systems to the job site, which includes complete electrical rooms.”
During peak construction, Bergelectric had 65 electricians, nine project foremen on site, one general foreman, and one superintendent. Bergelectric completed the new UHS West Henderson Hospital campus in 2024.