AECOM wins two awards for La Romaine hydro station
December 13, 2016
By
CCE
La Romaine-3 power tunnel. Image: AECOM.
AECOM has won two awards for its work at the La Romaine hydroelectric complex in Quebec.
Hydro-Quebec is constructing four hydropower generating stations along the river north of Hare-Saint-Pierre on the north shore of the Saint Lawrence River in Northern Quebec. The complete project is due to be completed in 2020 at which point it will amount to a total of 1,550-MW and will have an average annual output of 8.0 TWh. The $6.5-billion project is creating four reservoirs along the river.
In October AECOM and the contractor EBC-NELSON S.E.N.C. won the 2016 Infrastructure Project of the Year Award from the Tunnelling Association of Canada (TAC) for La Romaine-3, the third of four generating stations to be constructed on the Romaine River.
Hydro-Quebec is constructing four hydropower generating stations along the river north of Hare-Saint-Pierre on the north shore of the Saint Lawrence River in Northern Quebec. The four stations along La Romaine will amount to a total of 1,550-MW and will have an average annual output of 8.0 TWh. The $6.5-billion project is creating four reservoirs totalling 150 kilometres.
The TAC award for La Romaine-3 recognized AECOM’s outstanding design of the headrace tunnel and the related works. The scope included a search chamber and its connecting gallery, flow distributor and 1.8-km of penstocks. Commissioning is scheduled in fall of 2017.
Romaine-2, the second generating station in the complex, which was completed in 2014, also won an award this year for AECOM, from the Canadian Institute for Steel Construction’s Quebec region.
The station design concept used a maximum number of prefabricated components, replacing a large proportion of reinforced concrete structural elements with structural steel sections. It served as the prototype for the other units along the river.
“The challenges in designing this type of work are related not only to its complexity, but also to its intended sustainability and efficiency,” said André Beaudet, AECOM’s project manager for La Romaine-3. ‘’AECOM has over 100 years of experience in hydroelectricity, through its legacy companies in Quebec, and we are proud for having contributed to many of Hydro-Quebec’s projects that increase the production of clean, sustainable energy by harnessing our local water resources.”
(Postscript: On December 13 Hydro-Quebec halted construction on Romaine-4 after the death of a worker on site.)
To see more about the Hydro-Quebec Romaine complex, click here.
