International law firm Addleshaw Goddard has advised United Utilities (UU) on its Haweswater Aqueduct Resilience Project (HARP), with an estimated construction cost of circa £3bn, which has now reached commercial close.

The project, which comprises more than 50km of new tunnelling spanning Cumbria, Lancashire and Greater Manchester, will deliver the resilient infrastructure needed to continue to transport drinking water to 2.5 million people. It is the very first project procured via Ofwat's new funding model Direct Procurement for Customers (DPC), which has been created to pave the way for new large-scale water infrastructure in the UK.

HARP will be built by Strabag-Equitix (SE), a consortium of major international contractors, funders and investors including the UK arm of Austrian contractor Strabag and London-based infrastructure investor Equitix. 

The market-leading Addleshaw Goddard Water team, one of the only dedicated water sector practices in the UK, has been instrumental in developing the key commercial principles for DPC, a new model of financing water infrastructure. The team, has also drafted the suite of contractual documents and advised on the procurement documents, as well as playing a lead role in shaping the requisite licence changes with Ofwat as well as the other regulatory documents - all of which are entirely novel.

The Addleshaw Goddard team advising on the deal was led by Partners David Shaw and Phil Dupres, supported by a team including Rajdip Kaur, Michael Rainey, Frances Proctor, Mike Trodden, Susan Porritt and Kimberley Yu. The wider team included experts in procurement, real estate, regulatory, employment and tax, among other disciplines.

AG’s work on the HARP will form the basis of precedents for a pipeline of more than 20 projects across the UK, many of which the team has already been asked to advise on.

Phil Dupres, Partner and co-head of Water at Addleshaw Goddard, added: “It has been exciting to partner United Utilities in developing this new model over a number of years in what has been an intense yet rewarding process. In particular our role in supporting them in negotiating the terms of the complex documentation with SE showcases Addleshaw Goddard’s expertise in blending complex project finance, construction, procurement and regulatory work.”