China has launched the world’s first smart mega hydro-power station which has been successfully put into operation on Monday. Wudongde is the world’s seventh-biggest hydroelectric power plant, and the fourth largest in China.
Wudongde is the first dam in the world to fully use low-heat cement that can withstand large temperature differences.
The temperature difference, which causes the cracking of concrete and threatens the safety of the dam, is a worldwide problem in hydro-power engineering.
Dubbed the ‘smartest’ hydro-power station in the world, it is located on the border of the Sichuan and Yunnan provinces in southwest China.
The station has been constructed using cutting-edge intelligent technologies, including real-time temperature monitoring and advanced grouting equipment.
Thermometers and cooling pipes have been embedded in the concrete to detect its temperature in real time. The water flow can be automatically adjusted to realize the cooling process of concrete in an intelligent way.
Wudongde was designed as a concrete double-curved arch dam with a maximum height of 270 meters. The foundation bed of the dam is only 51 meters thick, which makes the hydro-power station the thinnest 300-meter arch dam in the world at present.
The “thin” concrete will be able to afford a storage of approximately 7.4 billion cubic meters of water in its reservoir.
The excavation length of the main workshop of the underground power station in Wudongde dam broke the world record with a height of 89.8 meters, equivalent to a 30-story building.
The hydropower station will be able to generate 38.9 billion kilowatts of electricity annually after its 12 generating units start operation. The project is scheduled to be fully completed in December 2021.
The amount of hydro-power produced by Wudongde will save 12.2 million tons of standard coal and reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide by 30.5 million tons and 104,000 tons every year.
Together with Baihetan Hydropower Station, Xiluodu Hydropower Station and Xiangjiaba Hydropower Station, Wudongde will form part of a cascade of power stations on the Jinsha River.
The cluster will have an installed capacity of more than 46 million kilowatts and will generate about 190 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity annually.
RT. com / ABC Flash Point News 2020.
Lower carbon emissions?
What a bunch of non-sense?
The advantage of low heat cement based concrete is not that it can “withstand large temperature differences” it’s that it generates less internal heat through the hydration process as it cures. Low heat cement is no more resistant to temperature variation than any other cement when fully cured.
So what really happened on scene?
My stress analysis class would correct you as well. The most significant consequence of milder curing temperatures is that the pace concrete placement; does not have to wait upon the stressful energetics of higher temperature, concrete curing. The timing between the placement lifts, can be shorter, and thus, the construction time (to reach design height) can be shorter as well.
There is also the benefit of a smaller, lesser, and smarter (using advanced computer modeling) artificial cooling infrastructure, of chilled water piping, embedded in the concrete lifts.
Interesting theory, thanks.
China could make a fortune selling online classes in Organizational Planning; Construction & Project Management. It is their real “secret weapon”. They scope projects in sufficient detail, in advance. Then they execute and achieve on-time performance within budgets. Let’s go to the Video Tape: the Covid-19 Hospitals; the Westinghouse Nuclear Electric Generating Plants; the Wudongde dam; the Baihetan dam. And lastly, the world’s favorite. Those nationwide high speed railway lines. They have all been essentially constructed concurrently, over the whole of the country. The work on the national rail network can best be described using the English translation of China’s… Read more »
The whole Nine Yards.