The 178m-long machine will excavate a 5km tunnel through a complex geological area deep in the Snowy Mountains, known as the Long Plain Fault Zone. The tunnel will eventually connect Tantangara reservoir with the power station built almost 1km underground.
After being tested and commissioned at manufacturer Herrenknechtʼs Guangzhou factory in China, the 12m diameter TBM was disassembled before being shipped to Port Kembla and is due to arrive in the coming weeks.
The large components will then be transported to the Snowy 2.0 remote work site at Marica and reassembled.
Snowy Hydro chief delivery officer – Snowy 2.0 Dave Evans said transport movements had been predominantly scheduled at night to avoid disruption to road users in collaboration with NSW Police and Transport for NSW.
“Large sections of the TBM will be transported at night time through Cooma in a few weeksʼ time – the large over size and over mass loads will be pretty hard to miss coming through the middle of town,ˮ he said.
“Our team is working tirelessly in some pretty challenging winter conditions at our Marica work front to get ready for this TBM.”
The machineʼs name will be announced in the coming weeks following a local competition involving the Stars Foundation and Tumut High School.
