The Lianghekou hydropower project is a 3GW run-of-the-river hydroelectric facility under construction in the Sichuan province of China.
The project is being developed by Yalong River Basin Hydropower Development Company with a total estimated investment of £6.7bn ($10.8bn).
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While the construction of the project commenced in October 2014, the rotor hoisting for the first unit of the facility was accomplished in September 2020.
The first unit is expected to come online by July 2021, while the remaining five units of the hydropower station are scheduled for commissioning by 2023.
At full capacity, the Lianghekou hydropower station is expected to generate up to 11 billion kWh of electricity annually.
Location and site details
The Lianghekou hydropower project is located 25km upstream of Yajiang County, in the Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan province, China.
The project site lies approximately 3,000m above the sea level, approximately 2km downstream of the convergence of the Yalong River and the Xianshui River.
Lianghekou power plant make-up
The Lianghekou hydropower project comprises a gravel-soil-core rockfill dam with spillways, an underground powerhouse, main transformer room, apart from the water diversion and tailwater structures.
The dam is 295m-high and 1.57km-long, and its total filling volume is approximately 43 million cubic metres (mcm).
It creates a reservoir with a normal storage capacity of 10.767 billion cubic metres (bcm) at a normal storage level of 2,865m. The adjusted storage capacity of the reservoir is approximately 6.56bcm.
The water intake tower for the hydroelectric facility measures approximately 115m-high, 159.8m-wide, and 33m-long.
The underground powerhouse will be equipped with six 500MW Francis turbine units operating at a water head of 260m. It is located in the mountain on the right bank at the intersection of the Yalong and the Qingda rivers.
Power evacuation
The electricity generated by the Lianghekou hydropower station will be evacuated to the Sichuan power grid through 500kV power transmission lines.
Financing
The Lianghekou hydropower project is being partially funded by the China Construction Bank (CCB) and the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC).
A syndicate of banks comprising Postal Savings Bank of China, China Agriculture Bank, China Development Bank and bank of China also provide £5.63bn ($8.61bn) long-term preferential interest rate credit funds for the project.
Contractors involved
Harbin Electric Group was contracted by the Yalong River Basin Hydropower Development Company for the supply of six Francis turbines and ancillary equipment for the project in September 2016.
China Gezhouba Group Second Company was contracted for the discharge building system engineering and construction work in July 2015.
A consortium of the 12th and the 5th Hydropower Bureau received the dam construction contract for the project in April 2015.
China Power Engineering Institute was engaged in the engineering and design of the Lianghekou hydropower station, while Chengdu Survey and Design Institute prepared the feasibility study and the construction general layout of the hydropower project.
A consortium of the 14th and the 16th Hydropower Bureau has been engaged for the construction of the water intake tower of the hydropower plant, while the consortium of One, Two, and Five Hydropower Bureau was contracted for the unmanned rolling operation of the dam core wall.
SANY heavy industry was contracted for the supply of seven rollers for the rolling work as part of the dam construction.
Lianghekou hydropower project background
The Lianghekou power project passed the pre-feasibility study review in September 2005, while the feasibility report on the project was prepared in December 2007.
The project’s environmental impact assessment (EIA), jointly funded by the National Development and Investment Corporation (52%) and Sichuan Investment Group Company (48%), was released in April 2013.
The Lianghekou power project is one of the 22-level power stations to be developed on the mainstream of the Yalong River approved by China’s National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) in September 2014.
