With an unrivalled portfolio of solutions, Stork UK keeps performance high and costs low
Equipped with over 50 years of expertise, Stork UK is dedicated to ‘Maintaining a Better World’. Driven by a customer-oriented ethos and forward-thinking ambition, Stork UK provides a multitude of asset life cycle management solutions, across a wide range of energy and industrial sectors, from planning and design through to development and construction, as well as commissioning, maintenance, modifications and decommissioning. The company’s range of services all assure an asset’s or plant’s integrity – from manufacturing and construction to inspecting its current condition and carrying out any required maintenance or repairs throughout its life cycle and into decommissioning.
Headquartered in Aberdeen, Scotland, Stork UK operates nationwide with operational bases in Falkirk, Teesside and Humberside. Each facility offers the company’s range of fully integrated solutions under a single project management interface, including industrial, mechanical, integrity, quality services, and plant and equipment hire.
PIC DEREK IRONSIDE / NEWSLINE MEDIA
Stork UK is a business that exemplifies teamwork, integrity and excellence. Energy, Oil & Gas recently sat down with Steve Hunt, Regional Director at Stork UK, to learn more about the business’ journey and how its current operations continue to improve asset management for clients across the UK and over a diverse range of sectors.
“Stork actually started its journey as part of the North Sea Oil Exploration and Development, mostly in the offshore sector, in the 70s and 80s based out of Aberdeen,” Steve begins. “Now, with 50 years of maintenance and asset integrity experience behind us, we deliver our proven solutions to a much wider array of energy and industrial sectors across the UK. We assess, maintain and improve the conditions of our clients’ assets. That’s what we do and that’s what we’re known for as a company.
“Whatever our client’s asset requires, Stork UK’s team of technicians are on hand to deliver the work needed in the safest and most cost-effective way possible.”
Offering the full service package often comes at a price, and companies across the UK in all industries frequently face economic challenges, Stork UK is dedicated to delivering value for money by offering cost-effective solutions
“Remaining cost-effective, while improving performance has probably been the biggest industry-wide challenge over the past five years,” Steve shares. “An area we have excelled in, is the use of multi-skilled teams on our clients’ sites. This reduces the number of individuals required to carry out projects, while driving down the carbon footprint associated with mass mobilizations. Where possible, we have also adopted remote digital inspections, enabling our subject matter experts to be in the field virtually with our technicians.
“Getting that balance in being cost-effective as well as sustainable is also a topic very much at the forefront of our and industries’ minds.
“In areas we can influence change, we strive to do so. We support our clients by assessing the condition of their existing facilities, identifying a range of emission reduction opportunities, supporting the development of business cases and then implementing the right solutions, bespoke to their needs. We also actively engage with original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), regulatory and leading industry bodies to keep our finger on the pulse of the latest advancements, while driving innovations in our own areas of expertise. By maintaining a better world, we are committed to adding value to our clients’ operations; helping to make them more sustainable, while also decarbonizing our own footprint.”
Over the past few years, Stork UK has been assessing its environmental impact and has developed a strategy to maintain and build on its Energy Management ISO 14001 and 5001 accreditations. The business has implemented a variety of sustainability initiatives, including the use of renewable energy, electric vehicles and forklifts, as well as energy-efficient lighting throughout their facilities.
“If you consider the basic areas that most people are adapting in their homes, we have looked at how we can do something very similar in our facilities,” Steve explains. “Earlier this year, we worked with a company called EcoVadis, a sustainability assessment platform, to balance strategies for the key categories of environmental impact, the labor we employ, human rights standards, and our core ESG and net-zero ambitions to make sure that we have a deliverable plan in place.
Continued diversification
“These incremental improvements, not only reduce our carbon footprint, but also contribute to cost savings and operational efficiencies, so there’s a benefit both ways.”
As the energy sector continues to evolve, companies are recognizing the need to evolve alongside the ever-changing industry. One way that Stork UK remains ahead of the curve, is through continued diversification.
“We’re embracing the need to diversify the offerings that we provide to a much wider range of sectors and marketplaces,” Steve describes. “Using our offshore expertise and resources across other industries has allowed us to gain a wider competitive edge. We’ve been really successful in transferring our integrated maintenance and asset integrity solutions into a range of industries across the UK, such as nuclear, onshore oil and gas, process, agriculture, chemicals, and even the rail sector.” 
With such a vast scope of capabilities and projects distributed across the nation, Stork UK is still passionate about fostering a positive, engaging culture despite having a workforce embedded in a range of remote sites.
“We started our transformation journey back in 2019 to develop the culture of the business,” Steve reflects. “We wanted our workforce to recognize that they are integral to the company and that they’ve got a say in what we do.
“In 2021, we recognized that we needed to do something a little different, so we developed an employee engagement platform called DRIVE (Development, Recognition, Inclusion, Voice and Engagement), to support our long established HSEQ platform, Safer Together. The response has been nothing short of outstanding. I’ve been really impressed with how that’s been adopted across the board. It’s now become part of the foundation of how we communicate with our people, listen to our employees, celebrate what they do and recognize their work on a day-to-day basis. This has led to us also achieving and maintaining our Gold Investors in People and Gold Investors in Young People accreditations.
“Having been recognized by a number of leading industry bodies and national awards, we’re seen as a leader in our field for employee engagement and now also diversity, equity and inclusion. We’ve presented to clients and external forums, sharing insights of best practice, are always looking for ways to learn from others and see it as our role to provide support to organizations who may be in the early stages of their journey.”
Team growth
In following, Stork UK also has a number of initiatives across the UK to empower the next generation of industry excellence, all of which have seen great success. From schools and educational partnerships to graduate training programs, Stork UK has been encouraging young people to pursue careers in the sectors in which they operate. The business has recently offered work experience placements to 26 young people via the King’s Trust, seen a 66 percent increase in graduates positions, an uptake of apprenticeship and trainee programs by 27 percent and for the fourth year has participated in the Career Ready mentoring program.
“Ultimately what differentiates Stork UK is the people that we employ and what they do. It’s our team as whole that are behind the growth and success of the company to date and will continue to drive the company forward safely and sustainably in the future.”
As 2024 draws to a close, Stork UK is excited for the year ahead. “As we approach the latter half of this year, we’re focusing on driving growth and getting ready for 2025. We’re going through a process of optimization of our operations to make sure that we’re competitive going forward into 2025,” Steve reveals. “We’re working to accelerate our growth by expanding further into new markets, but also looking at how we can develop much quicker and enhance our offering so that we can expand it on a much wider base across the UK.”
Steve finishes by reflecting on Stork UK’s core purpose: “As a company, we’re very much guided by a purpose that has developed over the past five years, which is maintaining a better world. We’re really committed as a company to making meaningful change – being the most cost-effective in maintaining clients’ assets in a sustainable fashion to build a better world and add value to all our stakeholders.”