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After completing the de-flooding and cleaning work of the Hidroituango powerhouse, which began at the beginning of last year, in the so-called heart of the hydroelectric plant now work is being done on the installation of power generation units.
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In this cavern 240 meters long, 23 meters wide and 49 meters high will be installed the eight Francis-type turbines that will generate 300 megawatts each. The first three are already in Antioquia and they hope to have two set up between December of this year and January of next.
This space is divided into two zones: north and south. In the first there will be the generation units from 1 to 4 and it is the one that is clean and stabilized.
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The southern area, for its part, was the most affected by the 271-day flood that the powerhouse had since May 10. This will house Units 5 through 8 and still has rubble.
William Giraldo, vice president of Power Generation Projects at EPM, said that the estimate is that by the end of December they will reach the base where the turbines will be installed, which are the suction tubes of units 1 and 2.
“This is at level 188 above sea level and we are at 182. We are flattening that terrain, we hope to have it by mid-December and between the end of this year and the beginning of the next we will be installing the suction tubes of these units”, Giraldo said.
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The company in charge of designing and building this equipment is General Electric Brasil, a company that will accompany EPM with the assembly of the first four generators.
“We had six of these equipment in the warehouse, but those that were mounted in units 1 and 4 at the time of the contingency were destroyed and had to be bought again. Three of these have already arrived and the rest is on the way, we hope it will arrive starting in 2021, ”he said.
If the schedule is met, the first two generators will be operating in the first half of 2022, and possibly another one in the second half and one more in 2023.
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Giraldo clarified that It will work on units from 5 to 8, units that are expected to be put into operation in 2024.
The official gave a piece of reassurance on the stability of the cavern, ensuring that the vault and ceiling of the caverns were repaired, as well as the walls, both in the powerhouse and in the beacons and the transformer cavern, spaces within of the mountain vital to the Hidroituango operation.
He assured that all the tasks are monitored every day from the Technical Monitoring Center that monitors seismic activity and other variables, which allows you to work calmly.
“In the south area of the powerhouse we have done some work, but we are going to expand to have the space where units 5 and 6 will be as a mounting area to assemble part of units 1 to 4. We had that southern area full of material to be able to stop machinery on it and thus check the ceilings of the cavern, which have already been reinforced, as well as the walls, ”Giraldo clarified.
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The first two generators will be operating in the first half of 2022, and possibly another one in the second half and one more in 2023
For the installation of the generators, they will require two 300-tonne overhead cranes, which EPM already has in its warehouse from Europe. These overhead cranes are expected to be installed in December.
Parallel to the work in the powerhouse, EPM advances in the plugging of two tunnels: the Auxiliary Deviation Gallery (GAD) and the right deviation tunnel.
In the first, which was plugged on April 28, 2018, work is being done on reinforcements between the communication in the intermediate discharge tunnel and the GAD, to prevent an accident from occurring.
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On the right tunnel, which was uncovered on May 12, 2018 and generated a torrential avenue in Puerto Valdivia, the pre-plugging is carried out from the intermediate discharge tunnel by installing 58 micropiles, which are nailed from a height of 60 meters. Of those they have placed 22. These will serve as a barrier, along with some nylon spheres that they will put in the tunnel to mitigate the passage of water and be able to build the definitive plug of 22 meters in diameter, which will also take 3 months and will have to be built on site. It would be by the end of 2021.
DAVID ALEJANDRO MERCADO
EL TIEMPO correspondent
MEDELLIN@ AlejoMercado10
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