A Chinese TBM manufactured by CREG is to be used to excavate the subaqueous road link in Świnoujście, Poland, a city located on several dozen islands. Austrian contractor Porr, as the lead of a joint venture with Gülermak of Turkey and Energopol Szczecin of Poland, will excavate the road link under the Swine River to connect two of the largest islands of the city. According to Lucyna Roszyk, a spokesperson for Porr, the plan is to launch the TBM in March 2021.

China-made TBM for Świnoujście road link

The central 1.5km length of the 3.2km long, two-lane bi-directional tunnel will be with excavated by the 12m diameter CREG slurry TBM at up to 38m below sea level at its deepest point. It will pass through fine sand and fine-medium sand with gravel at the landfalls, while below the Swine River the main deposits are fine-medium sand with gravel and over-conolidated sandy clay with gravel and chalk. To better cope with the geology, the machine design includes a cutterhead structure with a large opening ratio, a device for continuous wear detection of the cutterhead and cutters, a pipe extension system with zero slurry spilling, and a special articulation structure and cutterhead retraction for ease of steering.

Preparation of the TBM launch site

“Despite the coronavirus pandemic, the machine was produced according to the plan,” said Roszyk. “Most recently, the TBM underwent factory acceptance tests at the production facility, with all the tests relayed via video streaming from China, which allows us to proceed with its disassembly and transportation from China to Świnoujście. The TBM will be shipped as 129 components, with a total weight of 3,176 tonnes, taking about 60 days to complete the journey, of which 45 days will be at sea. Components are expected to arrive in late September with assembly in the 23m deep x 120m long x 19m wide launch shaft taking about three months. We plan to begin excavation in March 2021, according to our schedule, and should take about six to seven months to breakthrough.” Under the plan, construction is to be completed in September 2022, four years after work began.

Production of the lining segments will be in an on-site casting yard about 400m from the TBM launch shaft. “When excavation begins, we must have 200 complete rings, or about 1,600 lining segments, in storage,” said Roszyk. “There are two types of segments. Shorter 1.5m wide rings, will be used through a curve of 300m radius with rings of 2m wide segments used on the straight sections and through an exit curve of 500m radius.” Segments will be cast using rebar cage reinforcement and C50/60 concrete. “The main consideration is that the concrete segments will be exposure to salt sea water. For this reason the concrete is specified as XS2 and XA2,” she said.

TBM will excavate a single tube two lane bidirectional undersea road link

The Świnoujście TBM is is the largest slurry TBM exported from China to Europe and is the first slurry shield project by Porr in Poland. The Austrian company has worked on a number of tunnel projects in the Polish market, including a contract in the south-western part of the country to design and construct the S3 express road section 3 on which two tunnels with lengths of about 2.3km and 320m are to be built.

Świnoujście is located on 44 islands, with three of them inhabited: Uznam, Wolin, and Karsibór. About 80% or 41,000 residents of the city live on Uznam Island where most of tourism industry is also concentrated. Transportation between the islands of Uznam and Wolin is currently by ferry services which employ outdated vessels. Due to this, Świnoujście is periodically cut off from the rest of the country during unfavorable weather conditions. Świnoujście has obtained funding from the European Union which will finance 85% of the €411 million project.

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