Wudongde Hydropower Station
As the seventh largest hydropower station in the world with a cost of 100 billion, China's Wudongde Hydropower Station is so powerful that it has tens of millions of kilowatts, which makes Western countries sigh: Such a super hydropower station is really incredible. What about China? How on earth is such a super hydropower station built?
The construction process of Wudongde Hydropower Station
Before mentioning the Wudong Hydropower Station, we must first talk about the Jinsha River, which is connected to the branch basins and has a total length of 3,479 kilometers. As a water system with a maximum drop height of 5,100 meters The Jinsha River has a very large water energy content. If all the water energy in this river can be developed, it will mean that China can obtain a development capability that is at least several times as powerful as the Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze River. Obviously, After its own technical capabilities and construction capabilities met its needs, China began to build hydropower stations one after another on the Jinsha River, and the Wudongde Hydropower Station is one of the most famous among this series of hydropower stations.
A bird's-eye view of the Wudongde Hydropower Station
Although China wants to tame the Jinsha River, a fierce horse in the river, by building a large number of hydropower stations, it is not easy to tame this violent and violent Dajiang; as a river, A river with an astonishing drop. Compared with other rivers, the area where the Jinsha River flows has a relatively complex topographic structure, and a considerable part of it is located in earthquake-prone areas. If you want to build a large number of dams on this river, then The first thing that needs to be considered is how to find suitable areas to build these dams and ensure that these built dams will not be destroyed by the frequent earthquakes in the Jinsha River Basin.
Large hydropower stations located on the Jinsha River such as the Wudongde Hydropower Station have a very unique configuration: that is, the height of its dam and the ratio of the river valley are actually very close to 1:1, and, in order Reduce the weight of the dam and improve the structural strength and quality of the dam. For hydropower stations located on the Jinsha River such as Wudongde , the thickness of the main structure is thinner than that of hydropower stations located on other rivers or rivers. Even Even a super dam like Udonde, with a water surface height of 945 meters, has a thickest part of the main structure of the dam, which is only about 50 meters.
Imagination renderings of Wudong Hydropower Station
In order to ensure that such a slim main structure of the dam can still withstand the amazing water pressure brought by nearly one thousand meters of water depth, China used low-heat cement when building the Wudong Hydropower Station dam. concrete, and by establishing multiple automatic temperature sensors and a sprinkler cooling system on the dam body, the condensation temperature of the concrete has been maintained at around 20 degrees Celsius, thereby ensuring that the main structure remains stable during the entire dam construction process. Any gaps will appear due to thermal expansion, which makes the structural strength of the Wudongde Hydropower Station dam higher than that of other ordinary dams.
It is also for this reason that a series of large hydropower stations on the Jinsha River, including the Wudongde Hydropower Station, surprised experts from Western countries, because compared with a considerable number of large dams in other countries, this one in China The series of large-scale hydropower stations were like engineering miracles, and they couldn't help but admire them.
