On December 6, the first hard rock TBM exported to South America by CRCHI created an advance rate record of more than 1000 meters per month for the construction of the San Gawang Hydropower Project in Peru.

The San Gawang Hydropower Station in Peru is part of the project for the Belt and Road Initiative in South America. It is also the first Peruvian power project that has been invested in by Chinese enterprises. The total installed capacity of the San Gawang Hydropower Station is 209.3 MW, and the annual power generation is 1.25 billion kWh. After the completion and operation, it will vastly improve the optimal allocation of regional water resources and the sustainable economic and social development within South America.

The TBM is about 245m long and the cutterhead diameter is 5.83m. It is particularly suitable for tunnelling in the geological conditions of San Gawang Hydropower Station. The surrounding rock of the tunnel has good stability and the strength of the rock stratum is medium-high.

During the TBM assembly and commissioning, the on-site service team of CRCHI closely cooperated with the owner and the constructor. In less than 40 days, the TBMs main body assembly and was pushing horizontally into the tunnel work were completed, and the split launching was achieved. After the TBM was switched on, it took only two weeks to complete the single machine commissioning and joint commissioning so that the formal launching could go ahead.

Since November this year, the single shift advance rate of the TBM has kept breaking new records: from 10m per shift to 16m and 20m per shift. The maximum single shift advance rate exceeded 26m and the maximum daily advance rate reached 46 m. The cumulative advance rate in November has reached 1007.9 meters, which has greatly shortened the construction period. For further information on CRCHI please visit their website https://en.crchi.com// and for information on Peruvian projects please click here. 50/22.