How big is the Baihetan Hydropower Station? The world's second largest cost of 180 billion, how much electricity can be generated a year?
Speaking of Baihetan Hydropower Station, I believe everyone is a little unfamiliar. It is the second largest hydropower station in China after the Three Gorges Hydropower Station and the second largest hydropower station in the world. The power station officially started in 2013 and is expected to be fully completed in 2022. Put into use, the total investment will exceed 180 billion yuan, then the question is, how difficult is it to build the Baihetan Hydropower Station? How much electricity can it generate a year after it is completed and put into operation? Hello everyone, welcome to Lianheng Science Popularization, today's article, let's talk about Baihetan Hydropower Station, please like and follow, and develop a good habit.
Baihetan Hydropower Station is located at the junction of Sichuan Province and Yunnan Province. It is located in the lower reaches of the main stream of the Jinsha River. The Jinsha River is the upper reaches of the Yangtze River. It originates from the Tanggula Mountains on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. Around Baihe Beach, there are cliffs two or three thousand meters above sea level, and the construction is extremely difficult. So why does the country build hydropower stations here? In fact, the reason is very simple. Baihetan is located at the junction of the Eurasian plate and the Indian Ocean plate. Natural disasters occur frequently here. After the completion of the Baihetan Hydropower Station, it will have benefits such as power generation, flood control, sand retention, and improvement of river navigation capabilities. patron saint of the region.
Baihetan Dam is different from the Three Gorges Dam in that it uses a concrete double-curvature arch dam, and its technical difficulty is at the forefront of the world. First of all, I will give you a popular science about what an arch dam is. Generally speaking, dams are divided into gravity dams and arch dams, of which the Three Gorges Dam is a gravity dam. As a water retaining tool, a dam must withstand the thrust and pressure of water to maintain stability. Gravity dams rely on the frictional force generated between the dam's own weight and the foundation to withstand the thrust of water, thereby maintaining stability. The arch dam uses the action of the arch to convert the horizontal load it bears into axial pressure and transmit it to the rocks on both sides, and rely on the arch seat on both sides to support the dam body and keep the dam body stable.
Through the topographic survey around Baihetan, scientists finally adopted the design plan of the double-curved arch dam. The Baihetan dam crest elevation is 834 meters, the height is 289 meters, the maximum thickness of the arch crown beam of the dam body is 83.91 meters, and the center line of the dam crest is 83.91 meters. The arc length of 709 meters is divided into 31 dam sections in total, which requires 8.78 million cubic meters of concrete, which is equivalent to the volume of three Khufu pyramids. It is very difficult to build a hydropower station, let alone building such a behemoth around a cliff. The first problem the workers faced was how to drive the excavators and mixer trucks from the top of the mountain to the designated location.
However, China is known as an infrastructure madman, and it is not a false name. Engineers quickly came up with a way to directly connect the cliffs on the left and right sides with steel cables, and install cable cars on the steel cables. Each cable car can move 1000 left and right. meters, moving up and down 300 meters, not only can easily hoist large machinery, but also can hoist 9 tons of concrete to the designated location within 3 minutes.
In addition to working in the air, the engineers also dug a basement group around the Baihetan Hydropower Station. The total excavation volume of the basement group reached 25 million cubic meters, which is equivalent to 10 Khufu pyramids, of which the power plant workshop is 4387 meters long. With a width of 34 meters and a height of 88.7 meters, it is currently the largest underground factory in the world, and it looks very spectacular. As for why such a huge basement group was built, the main reason is that the cliffs on both sides of Baihe Beach are too steep to place large equipment, so the basement group can only be excavated. Looking at this three-dimensional schematic diagram, you will know that this underground factory has How grand.
In addition to "going up to the ground", the Baihetan Hydropower Station also uses many black technologies. As mentioned earlier, the concrete required for the Baihetan Dam is as high as 8.78 million cubic meters. Such a huge amount of cement is definitely not enough. Because ordinary cement releases a lot of heat in contact with water, it can cause the dam to crack. Therefore, in the construction of Baihetan Dam this time, China used low-heat Portland cement, which has the advantages of low hydration heat, slow heat release rate, and high post-strength, which can perfectly solve the cracking problem that occurs when large-volume concrete is poured. .
In addition, for the sake of safety, the engineers also pre-buried temperature sensors and circulating cooling water pipes in the concrete to monitor the temperature inside the dam at all times. Once the temperature is found to be too high, cooling measures will be taken, which means that China has already Mastered the technology of building large concrete facilities.
The construction of Baihetan took a lot of manpower and material resources. It will take 70 years from exploration and design to completion and production. So what about its power generation capacity? We all know that the Three Gorges Hydropower Station is the largest hydropower station in the world. Its single machine capacity can reach 700,000 kilowatts. However, although the Baihetan Hydropower Station is not as large as the Three Gorges Hydropower Station, its single machine capacity is as high as one million kilowatts. first existence.
A total of 16 million-kilowatt generator sets are installed in Baihetan Hydropower Station. A single generator set is more than 50 meters high and weighs more than 8,000 tons, which is equivalent to an Eiffel Tower. It can rotate 111 times, and the average annual power generation is as high as 60.24 billion kWh. What is the concept? Give two examples and you will understand.
In 2018, Chengdu's total electricity consumption was 63.147 billion kWh, and in 2020, Shanghai's electricity consumption was 157.6 billion kWh. The electricity generated by Baihetan Hydropower Station in one year can meet the electricity demand of a first-tier city, and the economic benefits are very considerable. . After the completion of the Baihetan Hydropower Station, it will mainly supply power to the Central China Power Grid and the East China Power Grid, becoming the main power source for power transmission from west to east.
Of course, the benefits of the Baihetan Hydropower Station are far more than just generating electricity. It also has a deeper strategic significance. The Baihetan Hydropower Station will promote the reform of China's energy supply, optimize and improve the energy structure in China, and help China implement the western development. And the construction of the Yangtze River Economic Belt has far-reaching significance.