Control No. 26-05

CUI//SP-PROCURE//FED ONLY

JUSTIFICATION AND APPROVAL

FOR OTHER THAN FULL AND OPEN COMPETITION

AMAZ Consulting - SCADA VA West Haven New Chilled Water Plant

Solicitation No. W912WJ26RA008

1. Contracting Activity:

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), New England District (NAE) 696 Virginia Road Concord, MA 01742

2. Description of Action:

Approval is requested for use of specified consulting firm in an upcoming acquisition.

This Justification and Approval (J&A) supports the use of a specified consulting firm in an upcoming firm fixed price construction project funded with procurement appropriations. The Government will not contract with the company directly but rather will require that offerors include the provision to utilize this firm as part of proposals submitted in response to a competitive solicitation that will lead to the award of a new construction contract.

3. Description of Supplies/Services:

This project is a Department of Veteran Affairs (VA) requirement to construct a new Chilled Water Plant and provide site utility improvements for the VA Connecticut Healthcare System (VACHS) in West Haven, Connecticut. Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) is a critical system currently in operation at the VA West Haven campus. The SCADA system is used to monitor, control, trend, alarm, and manage critical campus infrastructure systems including, but not limited to electrical distribution monitoring, and other mission-critical building and utility systems. The requirement is to provide AMAZ Consulting to provide systems integration programming for the extension of the existing SCADA system to the new Chilled Water Plant replacement and related utility upgrades. This J&A addresses only the programming effort. The installation, equipment, components and software associated with the SCADA system are separate from this document. However, the task of programming the existing SCADA system to digitally incorporate these new components (by others) would be addressed by AMAZ Consulting.

The cost to program the SCADA systems by AMAZ Consulting is estimated at .

The solicitation for the construction contract for this project will be an unrestricted Best Value Trade-off solicitation, competed under Revolutionary FAR Overhaul (RFO) Part 15. The solicitation is expected to be awarded in Fiscal Year (FY) 2027 with construction completed in FY 2031, with a total estimated construction cost of .

4. Authority Cited:

10 United States Code (U.S.C.) 3204(a)(1) as implemented by RFO 6.103-1 - Only One Responsible Source and No Other Supplies or Services Will Satisfy Agency Requirements. In accordance with this authority, the solicitation will specify that all offerors be required to procure only the cited brand name product.

5. Reason for Authority Cited:

a. Background:

VACHS’s primary mission is to provide advanced and patient-centric healthcare to veterans. Part of providing quality healthcare to veterans requires state-of-the-art infrastructure and systems to support that care. Replacement of the Chilled Water Plant with seamlessly integrated SCADA systems to facilitate the operation of the station’s electrical systems will foster significant improvements to the facility’s central utility plants and upgraded electrical systems making operation safer and more efficient. The current VA West Haven campus utilizes a SCADA system programmed by AMAZ Consulting. The SCADA system utilizes server-based software to gather electrical data in real time from remote locations in order to control equipment and conditions across the campus. The electrical equipment installed as part of the Chiller Plant Replacement project will need to be integrated with the existing complex SCADA system, which monitors and controls the campus electrical system. This integration does not require proprietary software or equipment but does require expert and experienced programing by the VAWH incumbent SCADA programmer, AMAZ Consulting. Past West Haven VA projects using other programmers have experienced failures and system interruptions requiring AMAZ Consulting to be brought in afterwards to correct the system deficiencies.

b. Justification:

AMAZ Consulting is the incumbent SCADA programmer for the VACHS. The existing SCADA system monitors and controls the essential electrical system powering mission critical equipment and systems. Any additional equipment and systems that are added to the SCADA system must integrate seamlessly into this production system while maintaining uninterrupted monitoring of existing equipment and systems. For a SCADA system this complex and critical, the programming can only be completed by the incumbent firm that has the required experience with this unique system.

Programming of industrial control systems such as SCADA is a challenging effort, especially when tying into existing production systems that have a mission impact. The existing SCADA system controls the electrical power distribution and generation systems across the VA campus.

This project provides new essential electrical equipment, which must be integrated into the existing SCADA controlling the campus’s existing power distribution and generation systems.

Integration requires SCADA reprogramming affecting both new and existing electrical equipment. VA West Haven campus cannot accept the risk of an outside programmer causing failure of existing essential electrical systems outside this project’s scope. Outside programmers without inherent knowledge of the system, its operations and interconnectivities, as well as programming irregularities, can cause near term failures (loss of power to critical hospital systems for extended periods) or long term impacts (systems failures months after installation).

The existing SCADA system contains proprietary programming logic, custom graphics, and database communication mapping. AMAZ Consulting has added trending configurations, reporting functions, and integration methods that have been developed over multiple years to support the unique operational requirements of the Medical Center’s electrical systems. At the Medical Center, past work done by other contractors that were not intimately experienced with the existing system components and operations caused critical electrical systems to fail or not operate as required. This caused subsequent impacts to critical Medical Center systems. At times, this caused impacts to patient care and continuous (24/7) monitoring by facility staff until the problem was resolved by the contractor, which caused major impacts to Medical Center operations. In turn, this required the incumbent contractor, AMAZ Consulting, to be contracted separately to correct the system issues caused by the inexperienced contractor.

For the reasons stated above, RFO 6.103-1 is the appropriate authority for this procurement as only AMAZ Consulting programming will meet the Government's requirements.

c. Alternatives:

The alternative would be to allow another firm to program the existing SCADA system. If any firm other than the VACHS incumbent programmer performs integration work on the existing SCADA system, based on previous experience onsite, the lack of system knowledge and/or expertise will result in unacceptable risk to the campus and the mission critical systems. This could result in system failures and impacts to Medical Center operations.

d. Impact:

Based on previous experience onsite with inexperienced contractors working on the systems in lieu of AMAZ Consulting, system failures, operational impacts, and contractor performance issues are expected if the J&A is not approved. On past projects where AMAZ was not performing the programming and integration work, significant system failures occurred, such as on the Load Center 1A Upgrade project where the subcontractor had several different technicians mobilized to the site to address commissioning of switchgear and generators. The main problem was synchronization of the generators, being of different vintages, which will be the same on this project, to meet Joint Commission requirements, including generators required to start within 10 seconds. Issues leading to problems with subcontractors that are not experts on the local SCADA system, included the following:

Testing failed repeatedly, leaving the campus essential electrical system unstable.

This required VA Electric Shop to post 24/7 watch over the generators and electrical systems to ensure back-up capability.

Failed tests occurred many times requiring not only the contractor but also VA personnel (entire Electric Shop) to remobilize several times to a new replanned “off-hour” time frame.

Issues ultimately lead to contractor cure notices due to lack of contract performance, delays, and facility impacts.

6. Efforts to Obtain Competition:

a. Effective Competition: For the reasons discussed above, a specific programmer will be specified in an otherwise competitive solicitation for a construction project. The specified firm required for SCADA system programming is AMAZ Consulting.

A Notice of Intent (NOI) to sole source the brand name component that offerors will be required to procure was posted on February 4, 2026 to determine potential sources for the system. The NOI was published for fifteen days on SAM.gov and received no responses.

b. Subcontracting Competition: Subcontracting opportunities for this programming this system will be limited since the Prime Contractor is expected to contract directly with AMAZ Consulting. However, it is expected that there will be other areas of work that will allow ample competitive subcontracting opportunities.

7. Actions to Increase Competition:

Based on the information provided in the above paragraphs, increasing competition for this action is not feasible. The specified consultant requirement for this system does not preclude a wide range of contractors from submitting a proposal on this procurement of an otherwise competitive construction project.

8. Market Research:

USACE personnel consulted with the VA in June 2026 to identify any comparable consultants that could meet the VA's specific requirements. Consultations were with the VA Medical Center Facilities Management Service and Construction & Facilities Management. The VA cited past experience with previous contractors that were not experienced with the Medical Center’s complex SCADA system that caused significant critical electrical system failures and impacts to Medical Center operations. Based on this VA, stated that no other source can provide the required services for the Chilled Water Plant replacement SCADA system. It was determined that no firms could properly and fully integrate and meet these requirements to program the SCADA system and noted that award to another vendor would create an unacceptable operational risk to critical facility infrastructure.

Additionally, a NOI to Sole Source was posted to SAM.gov. See Section 9 (Interested Sources).

9. Interested Sources:

A NOI to determine potential sources for this system was published on February 4, 2026, and closed February 19, 2026. No comments or responses were received. Once approved, this J&A will be published with the solicitation in accordance with RFO 6.301(b)(2).

10. Other Facts:

N/A

11. Technical Certification