CTG-owned Wudongde Dam achieves concrete pouring targets in 2019

Wudongde Hydropower Station, the world's third largest hydropower station under construction, announced that it has achieved concrete pouring goal on December 28, laying a solid foundation for the closure of the lower gate of the diversion tunnel and the overflow of middle holes in the dam body in 2020.

The construction team has elevated the highest section of the dam body by 100 meters and poured one million cubic meters of concrete in 2019, a second year in a row that it has accomplished the feat.

Wudongde Hydropower Station, located on the Jinsha River at the border of Sichuan Province and Yunnan Province, is the most upstream station of the four hydropower cascades in the lower reaches of the Jinsha River.

Electricity generation will serve as its primary role with other functions including flood control, shipping and promoting economic and social development in the region. Once completed, its total installed capacity will reach 10.2 million kilowatts, making it the seventh largest in the world.

Wudongde dam is a concrete hyperbolic arch dam with a crest elevation of 988 meters and a maximum height of 270 meters. It is currently the thinnest 300-meter ultra-high arch dam in the world, with an upstream surface arc length of 326.95 meters and a thick-height ratio of merely 0.19.

The dam was divided into 15 sections to be filled with concrete, with a total concrete placement volume of 2.86 million cubic meters, equivalent to 75,000 standard containers.

Wudongde Hydropower Station, owned by China Three Gorges Corporation (CTG), is scheduled to complete concrete placement work in June 2020, commission the first batch of generators in July 2020 and put all units into operation in 2021.