9 years in 12 minutes: Documentary of the construction of the Limmern PSP | Axpo

[Music] between 2009 and 2018 the energy company Expo expanded the existing plants run by craft vehicle into limo nage the heart of the project was built between the lemon Borden reservoir and Lake Mert situated six hundred and thirty meters higher the new underground pumped storage power plant lemon the new plant has pump and turbine capacities of 1,000 megawatts and harnesses the height difference between the two reservoirs Construction presented a huge challenge as the whole site lies high up in the mountains only the tier faired installation site at the far end of gröna lund had road and rail access from here all necessary machinery building materials and construction teams were transported up the mountain by aerial cableway construction of the four kilometer long access tunnel from tear fed to the caverns inside the mountain began in 2012 its diameter of eight meters can accommodate the heavy equipment to be installed in the new plant at the same time the powerhouse and transformer keven's were excavated in stages and secured from top to bottom the 150 meter long and 50 meter high powerhouse cabin is gigantic it's entire volume had to be broken out of solid rock although some areas were excavated manually mostly explosives were used all the excavated material had to be transported out of the mountain so in a tunnel underneath the coven's the rock was crushed a large part of the material was used to build the concrete dam for Lake Mert on the mountain the rest was utilized in an underground concrete plant for the structural lining of the caverns early in 2012 excavation of the 50 meter high powerhouse cavern was complete now the interior construction could begin the schedule was tight so many activities proceeded at the same time the draft tubes for the Pumped turbines were being installed in their foundations while at the same time the cavern lining was being concreted the fault which was supported only by the rock was thus transformed into a closed arch enabling it to withstand the pressure from the surrounding rock in the turbine generator pits the concrete foundations for the units were poured on top of the draught tubes installed previously in total over 80,000 cubic meters of concrete were used in the caverns enough for around 700 suburban homes a major construction site deep within the mountain to connect the plant to the power grid high voltage cables were routed through the access tunnel to the tear fed substation from here a new 380 kilovolt overhead transmission line was built along the lintel valley the 17 kilometer long transmission line forms part of the Swiss extra high voltage grid 53 new pylons were erected for the overhead line construction was a particular challenge as some pylons reached 89 metres in height in inaccessible terrain the construction material had to be carried in by helicopter while the transmission line was being completed the heavy equipment transport for the powerhouse was in progress in the valley below components such as the spiral casing for the pump turbines were too big to be transported by usual means at 190 tons of the machine transformers the heaviest individual items weigh too much for the 40-ton aerial cable way so the large and heavy parts were transported directly into the caverns through there now a completed access tunnel the huge dimensions of this tunnel and its 200 ton capacity funicular were specifically designed for these large and heavy components [Music] Assembly of the machine groups then began the spiral casings have to withstand the huge hydraulic pressure exerted by the water and were fully embedded and massive reinforced concrete this is where the pump turbine runner will later rotate the combined thrust bearing for the turbine generator shaft train was installed above the pump turbine while the turbine generator pits were being completed the rotating parts of the generators the rotors took shape at around three hundred and thirty tons apiece they were too heavy even for the funicular it had to be assembled inside the powerhouse cavern at the same time the stationary component of the generators the stator was installed on its foundation above the pump turbine finally the assembled rotor was lowered into the stator during operation the rotor rotates some eight times a second and develops the equivalent power of about three thousand average cars by November 2015 the first two machine groups were fully assembled and the first unit was successfully synchronized with a power grid while the caverns were being excavated construction of the upstream pressure shafts from Lake Mert also began the shafts were excavated one after the other using a tunnel-boring machine they are inclined at 40 degrees and terminate in the valve chamber 600 metres higher here the upstream pressure tunnel answer'd shaft a vertical shaft open at the top for compensating pressure fluctuations were also constructed [Music] from the valve chamber using a temporary rail system the penstocks were installed in the pressure shafts the delivery and installation of the pipes was extremely complex the prefabricated lengths of penstock were welded together only after being positioned in the shaft in total two kilometers of penstock were installed over three years the upstream pressure tunnel connects the valve chamber to lake mud eight meters in diameter it's as big as a road tunnel during 2012 and 2013 the lake mud intake an outlet structure was constructed at the tunnel portal and was later submerged from here water flows through the upstream pressure tunnel and the penstocks to the turbines from the powerhouse Kevin the two downstream pressure tunnels to the lumen Borden reservoir were excavated all tunnels and shafts for the hydraulic waterways were now complete for the construction of the intake and outlet structures lake lumen was almost fully emptied up to 200 cubic meters of water will flow through these two structures every second their design minimizes turbulence losses and the water flow above the normal water level of the lake lies the auxin nefeli material handling site with its gravel silos and crushing plot the excavated material from the caverns used to build the lake mud concrete dam was processed and stored here from here the material and all construction machinery were transported to butanol via a second aerial cable way this can carry loads of up to 30 tons [Music] the aerial cable way leads to the lake mud dam site on route and helped 2,500 metres above sea level the dam is formed from 68 segments each 15 metres wide the entire dam was built over three summers it's around 1,000 meters long and after 36 meters high the dam raised the level of Lake Mert by as much as 30 meters almost tripling the lakes original capacity the extent of the building site high up in the mountains was impressive up to 150 workers lived in this construction site camp an on-site state-of-the-art concrete plant produced the concrete for the dome by 2012 around a quarter of the dam was under construction and it was possible to imagine the size of the final structure [Music] during the summer of 2013 the dam section on the opposite flank was built this section features the highest segments [Music] by the end of 2013 around two-thirds of the dam had been erected two years later in November 2015 the dam was complete the term is equipped with highly sensitive monitoring instruments and the crest allows for pedestrian access Lake Mott was fully impounded for the first time in the summer of 2016 the construction facilities had previously been removed in the powerhouse Kevin the new units are taken into service one after the other the pump turbines and generators are extremely flexible in operation and can switch between pump and turbine modes within only a few minutes the machines are monitored in the power plants control room in tear fed machine operation is determined in Barton depending on the electricity market having completed this highly complex project the maternal is now home to a dam at the highest elevation in Europe and at over 1,000 metres the longest in Switzerland it holds backwater enabling the flexible generation of electricity due to its high level of operating flexibility the new lemon pump storage power plant plays an important role in ensuring grid stability and the reliability of supply in Switzerland and in [Music]

Channel: Axpo

Views: 3,865

Rating: 4.8730159 out of 5

Keywords: Voller Energie, Energieversorger, Strom, Unternehmen, Axpo, Elektrizität, Energieerzeugung, Schweiz, Energie, Stromproduktion, Internationales Geschäft, Vertrieb, Handel

Id: Hv8DPzaed0Q

Length: 12min 8sec (728 seconds)

Published: Fri Oct 25 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/swarlay]

Came across this video about the construction of a pumped-storage plant in Switzerland today and I thought it might be of interest to people on this sub.

It was produced by the energy company, but IMHO it’s still entertaining and informative.

[u/esplanadeoc]

This is so cool.

[u/hummve]

Very cool!